David Herle

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David Herle is a Canadian political consultant and one of the top advisors to former Prime Minister Paul Martin. He was a senior partner at Earnscliffe Strategy Group, a consulting firm with close ties to Martin. He is now a principal of the Gandolf group, a leading polling and market research firm.

Herle has been active in the Liberal Party since his youth, and was a key strategist for the Martin leadership campaign. In the 2004 election, he served as Martin's campaign co-chair. During the election, as prospects for the Liberals began looking poorly, Herle was a strong advocate of demonizing Martin's primary opponent, Stephen Harper. Although this strategy was criticized as inaccurate, it resonated enough with Canadian voters for Martin to salvage a minority government.

Herle has been a strong supporter of Martin since Martin's first, failed bid at the Liberal leadership, which resulted in the election of Jean Chrétien as Liberal Party leader and three successive terms of Chrétien as prime minister. Herle was among the most prominent Liberals pushing for Chrétien to retire, to make way for Paul Martin.