by Jennifer Palmer, Oklahoma Watch
April 23, 2025

Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters, who some pollsters predict is eyeing a run for governor in 2026, now has a team on the state’s payroll who have built their resumes managing political campaigns. 

One recent hire is Matt Mohler, a political strategist from Florida. Another is Chad Gallagher, who founded a consulting company and is a longtime advisor to former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee. 

They join another political operative at the agency, Matt Langston, who is Walters’ chief policy advisor. Langston ran Walters’ 2022 campaign for superintendent and joined the staff in January 2023. He runs a Texas-based firm, Engage Right. 

Mohler was a special projects manager at Florida Power & Light for the past four years, according to his LinkedIn profile, and a senior strategist at Front Line Strategies for 17 years until May 2024. Front Line Strategies is one of Florida’s most prominent political consulting firms. Front Line and its founder, Brett Doster, have worked with Jeb Bush, Pam Bondi and Mitt Romney, according to Florida Politics, a news site covering campaigns and politics in Florida.

Langston, too, worked for Front Line Strategies. He was a consultant there from 2012-2013, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Gallagher, in addition to advising Huckabee, founded Legacy Consulting, a firm that works on political campaigns, messaging and crisis management. He lobbies for Huck PAC, Huckabee’s political vehicle. Gallagher also managed public relations for the Duggar family, of the reality TV show “19 Kids and Counting,” in the wake of abuse allegations against one of the family members. A jury convicted Josh Duggar of possessing child pornography in 2021.

Legacy Consulting lobbies for ClassWallet in Arkansas, which was awarded $63 million in contracts to manage Arkansas’ private school voucher program. Gallagher, with his wife, founded a private Christian school. 

“If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s probably a duck,” said Appleseed Center for Law and Justice Executive Director Colleen McCarty. “It sure looks as though he’s assembling a campaign team on the public payroll. If he is, those can be crimes, and Oklahoma has convicted elected officials for a lot less.”

Agency Won’t Explain Paychecks

Langston is one of the Department of Education’s highest-paid employees, collecting $130,000 in 2024 and more than $69,000 in the first three months of 2025, according to state payroll records. 

Gallagher, a temporary senior advisor hired in February, is paid $46.15 an hour — or nearly $96,000 per year, according to the agency. He collected $3,692 in March for 80 hours of work. 

Mohler is the department’s chief of staff. He started Jan. 20, and collected four payments worth a combined $76,000 from the state in February and March, his first two months on the payroll, records show. All the payments were coded as regular pay.

A spokeswoman for the Education Department, Grace Kim, refused to answer questions about the payments or confirm Mohler or Gallagher’s salary, even though that information is public record. Kim said the department does not comment on personnel matters.

“It’s quite concerning, the amount of money they are getting paid and understanding their background,” said Rep. Cyndi Munson, D-Oklahoma City. “It doesn’t seem like they are there to help the superintendent or the agency figure out how to improve our education outcomes.” 

Munson is the minority leader for the House and is running for governor.

Walters’ new hires coincided with the departures of key staff from the agency. Those include Andrea Fielding, Kourtney Heard, David Martin, Dan Isett, and Tucker Cross. 

Isett resigned as the department’s director of communications after 18 months on the job. Even though Isett earned a salary of $115,000, he collected $76,000 in February, payroll records show. 

In December, Walters awarded more than $600,000 in end-of-year bonuses to staff at the agency. Most received an amount equal to 2.5% of their annual salary, but a select few received significantly more. 

Langston received nearly $45,000 in January, $34,000 more than a typical paycheck. 

The agency has refused to explain whether that amount is a bonus, a raise, or both.

Langston did not respond to a voicemail or an email. 

In June, a group of state lawmakers asked Attorney General Gentner Drummond to investigate Langston’s employment status amid concerns that he is a ghost employee, which former Rep. Mark McBride, who initiated the request, defined as an individual who is listed on the payroll but does not actually perform the duties associated with their position. That, he said, would constitute a misuse of public funds and undermine public trust. 

Drummond declined to pursue the investigation.

Walters is halfway through his 4-year term, but his 2022 campaign remains active. Ethics Commission records show that Walters’ campaign has made just one payment to Langston’s firm, Engage Right, since the 2022 election. It was for $5,000 on March 4, 2024. Those reports go through the end of 2024.

Engage Right nonetheless has continued sending emails for the campaign, including one on Nov. 8, recapping the 2024 election results. Labeled highly confidential and not for distribution, the email claims Oklahoma’s results — in the presidential, state supreme court and legislative races — validate Walters’ platform.

It was signed Matt Langston.

This article first appeared on Oklahoma Watch and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

The post Walters’ New Hires Steeped in Politics, Not Education appeared first on oklahomawatch.org

Oklahoma Watch, at oklahomawatch.org, is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that covers public-policy issues facing the state.

Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.

Political Bias Rating: Left-Leaning

The content presents a critical view of Oklahoma’s Superintendent of Public Instruction Ryan Walters and his hiring practices, which involves bringing political operatives into positions within the education department. The focus on potential misuse of public funds, allegations of ghost employment, and the comments from political figures such as the minority leader, Rep. Cyndi Munson, suggest a skepticism towards Walters’ actions and his administration. The involvement of consulting firms with ties to established Republican figures and the negative framing of Walters’ decisions may indicate a partisan perspective aligned with left-leaning viewpoints on governmental accountability and education policy. Additionally, the critical tone surrounding the bonuses and salaries within the administration supports this bias.