Austin News

The critical thinking skills Matt Brownfield learned at Patrick Henry College help him guide his clients through the COVID-19 crisis.

Brownfield, a political consultant with Murphy Nasica & Associates in Austin, helps his clients communicate with voters and constituents.

“As we are in a crisis right now, a lot of what we have been focusing on is providing information to voters and constituents in these districts about both the economic and the health impact of this disease,” Brownfield told Austin News. "And just helping our clients be very private with those folks in their communities even though you can’t be physically with them.”

Matt Brownfield helped one of his clients, Rep. Gary Gates, with care packet distributions to help families affected by COVID-19. | Facebook

He helps them connect digitally by texting, phone calls, town halls or the mail to provide constituents with resources and information.

Recently he worked with his client Rep. Gary Gates (R-Fort Bend) on a care packet distribution. Gates distributed more than 1,700 care packets on April 24 and over 5,000 to date. He also provided 200 KN95 masks to the Fort Bend ISD Police Department.

Brownfield said several of his clients have located personal protective equipment, including masks and medical gowns, and distributed them to where they were needed.

He gained experience working on campaigns at Patrick Henry. He also worked full-time for one Texas campaign while in school—the first time he had a full-time position campaigning.

He did not plan on a career as a political consultant. When he left college, he pursued an academic career. His graduate studies were successful, but the end of graduate school coincided with the 2008 recession and the job market for academia contracted, so Brownfield started working on campaigns again.

In 2009, he started Nasica Consulting with a friend from graduate school. They merged with another company in 2013, forming Murphy Nasica & Associates.

When Brownfield thinks about what Patrick Henry taught him, what comes to mind are the meetings he has with people who want to run for office.

“I always ask a series of questions,” Brownfield said. “The first question I ask is why is it you want to do this? What is causing you to want to run for office?”

That question and making sure clients running for office have a credible track record of experience in serving their communities are priorities he said Patrick Henry instilled in him.

Brownfield met his wife, Lauren, in college. She was in the first four-year class that graduated. The couple now has three children whose attendance at Austin Classical School probably made the entire family better prepared than some to deal with home education during the coronavirus shutdown.

“Our kids attend a classical Christian school that’s the collaborative model. So they spend part of their time in the traditional classroom and part of the time at home, with co-instruction from the parents,” he said.

Both parents arrived at Patrick Henry with some homeschooling background and other instructional methods. Brownfield said he appreciates Patrick Henry’s approach to education, which calls for parents to be engaged in their kids’ educations.

“Lauren takes the primary role on the day to day aspects with the kids from an education front,” he said. “For our family, the adjustment has been I guess a 50 percent adjustment rather than a 100 percent.”

“For all of us these are unprecedented times,” Brownfield said.

Patrick Henry helped him engage a problem and think about it from multiple perspectives, which he said is now required in trying to weigh the public health threat with the economic crisis.

“And then again, I think Gov. Greg Abbott is doing a fantastic job in Texas of balancing the health impact with the economic impact on his plan to get people working again... in taking that kind of measured approach,” Brownfield said. “That is the sort of thing I advise my clients and work through things at a personal level. Those are the things we keep in mind.”

He said the family is active in their Austin church, Grace & Peace Presbyterian.

Brownfield said he and other Christians are supposed to run toward those in need and try to help as much as possible. When those people are in an economic or health crisis, he said that is when Christians are needed the most.

“Patrick Henry tried to instill in all of us with the education there… a sense of public service and a sense of obligation," Brownfield said, "to not just engage with the community but be a part of the community at large."