Michael Collins

USA TODAY

WASHINGTON -- Before most of the speakers trash-talking Hillary Clinton at the Republican National Convention even left the stage, Isaac Wright and his small army of fact-checkers were already blasting out real-time rebuttals in Clinton’s defense.

“Lyin’ Ted Lies And Fear Mongers About Syrian Refugees,” blared an all-caps headline on a take-down of Texas Sen. Ted Cruz.

“Pence Lies About Hillary’s Comments About The Benghazi Tragedy,” trumpeted a critique of the GOP convention's prime-time address by Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, the party's vice presidential nominee.

In its biggest coup, the group got its hands on an advance copy of Republican nominee Donald Trump’s acceptance speech and then compiled and distributed a report on what it called “Trump’s lies” – hours before Trump addressed the convention and the nation Thursday night.

“It’s important to stop false narratives and untrue things before they become accepted,” said Wright. The Tennessee native who runs Correct the Record, a super PAC that provides rapid-response defenses of Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, against what the group calls baseless right-wing attacks.

Wright, a bearded father of two who cut his teeth on political races in Tennessee and other southeastern states, has been the group's executive director since 2013.

The group’s operations center, or “war room,” is located on the sixth floor of a modern, glass-front high-rise office building in one of Washington’s up-and-coming neighborhoods.

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Virtually around the clock, the group’s researchers, communications experts and digital gurus monitor live news feeds from the major television networks, cable channels and even local television markets. They search newspapers and watch social media sites for disparaging or misleading remarks about Clinton or her record.

Whenever they spot what they believe is a distortion or outright lie, they fight back – with point-by-point fact-checks quickly disseminated to the news media, with slick videos that often use the offenders’ own words against them, and with a cascade of social media posts on sites like Twitter and Facebook.

“People in our war room are brilliant – they are some of the brightest minds in Washington,” Wright said earlier this week from the cubbyhole of an office where he oversees the group’s operations.

Directly behind Wright’s desk, on a mint-green wall, hangs the sparsely decorated office’s most prominent feature – a huge whiteboard that, on this particular day, has been wiped clean to keep a reporter from seeing what projects the group has in the works. Tacked to an adjacent wall are posters of Clinton’s campaign logo.

Wright has admired Clinton for years. He served as South Carolina communications director on her first presidential campaign back in 2008.

Clinton is probably the best-qualified candidate ever to run for president, Wright says. Polls show most Americans don't believe she's honest or trustworthy, but Wright attributes her high negatives to a long-term attack “from the right-wing spin machine that goes back years.”

“They realize she is somebody with not just a vision, but with the leadership and capability to implement that vision and move America forward,” he said. “And effective leadership scares partisan politicians on the other side.”

Wright, a graduate of the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, was working on political campaigns and as a public affairs consultant in Little Rock, Ark., when he got a call in fall 2013 telling him about a new group being founded by conservative-turned-liberal author David Brock to defend Clinton against such attacks.

The group was Correct the Record, and Wright quickly signed on.

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Before the organization was fully staffed, Wright penned some of its first defenses of Clinton. His role today is more that of a chief operating officer. He handles budget and personnel matters, oversees a staff of nearly 40 and helps with communications and messaging, said Brad Woodhouse, the group’s president.

Wright’s first exposure to a campaign war room was as a young staffer on then-Vice President Al Gore’s campaign for president in 2000. During political debates that year, he was given the task of making sure rapid-response materials in need of vetting were seen by the right people before they were sent out. Once they were approved, he clicked the “send” button.

His stint with Gore’s campaign was followed by other jobs in politics and government. He worked on the congressional staff of then-Rep. Harold Ford Jr., D-Tenn., and on Ford’s unsuccessful campaign for Senate. Wrightalso served as a campaign adviser and communications director to Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe and later helped Jay Nixon get elected governor of Missouri.

“He has a calm and steady demeanor, which is not typical of people in this business,” Woodhouse said. “He’s a great strategist. He really understands the convergence of communications strategy, social media strategy, good solid messaging to voters, to the press. And he’s incredibly organized.”