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David Kochel, a Republican strategist based in Iowa who worked on both of Mitt Romney’s presidential campaigns, is joining Jeb Bush’s political action committee as a senior strategist and is in line to serve as Mr. Bush’s national campaign manager.

“David is one of the most talented state-based operatives in the nation and brings a different focus and different set of priorities to our effort to communicate Governor Bush’s focus on economic and social mobility,” said Sally Bradshaw, Mr. Bush’s longtime strategist.

The move to tap Mr. Kochel, who advised Mr. Romney for over six years, represents a shot across the bow of the 2012 Republican nominee, who is now considering a third bid for the White House.

Mr. Kochel offered only praise for Mr. Romney, while also promoting Mr. Bush’s strengths.

“I really believe Governor Bush is the right person for the right time,” he said. “He has a successful conservative record in Florida, and I’d put that record up against anybody else.”

Mr. Kochel is moving this spring to Miami to join Mr. Bush’s national effort, but his hiring also indicates that Mr. Bush is likely to compete aggressively in Iowa, where hard-line conservatives are a force in Republican contests.

“There are a number of people here who will be interested in signing up,” Mr. Kochel said. “You compete everywhere because that’s how you win delegates.”

Mr. Kochel, a native of central Iowa, worked his way up in state politics, serving as state party executive director in his 20s and, most recently, as a senior adviser to Senator Joni Ernst in her vaunted campaign last year. A direct mail strategist, he has also worked on a number of campaigns outside Iowa.

Mr. Bush’s advisers declined to speak about what the hiring said regarding Mr. Romney, but emphasized that they are fond of Mr. Kochel in part because he is not based in Washington and his political experience is mostly in state races.

“This is a reflection of Governor Bush’s intent, should he go forward with a campaign, to make the race focused on early states, Super Tuesday states and running governors-style races,” said a senior adviser to Mr. Bush. “This is not going to be a D.C.-driven, top-down structure. That’s not the Jeb Bush way.”

There has been intense speculation in Washington in recent weeks that Mr. Bush was likely to tap an operative based in the capital and the matter of who to hire had even become a topic of some debate within Mr. Bush’s circle. One name often mentioned as a likely prospect, and reported by CNN as such this week, was Sara Fagen, who was once White House political director under George W. Bush.

But Mr, Kochel has long been close to a close adviser to Mr. Bush, Mike Murphy – the two worked together in the campaigns of Gov. Terry Branstad of Iowa – and has been friends with Ms. Bradshaw since they both began helping Mr. Romney early in the 2008 presidential election cycle.

Mr. Bush’s loyalists are determined to create an identity for him separate from his brother, former President George W. Bush. But in organizing the makings of a presidential campaign, they are reprising the early moves of the former president.

Ahead of his 2000 campaign, George W. Bush, then the governor of Texas, relied mostly on advice from his own cadre of Texas-based strategists, creating some distance from operatives connected to his father, former President George Bush.