Ainsley Hayes
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Ainsley Hayes | |
|---|---|
 Emily Procter as Ainsley Hayes |
|
| First appearance | In this White House |
| Last appearance | Requiem |
| Statistics | |
| Occupation | White House Associate Counsel (Seasons 2-3), Fellow at Hoover Institution (briefly in Season 7) |
| Portrayed by | Emily Procter |
| Created by | Aaron Sorkin, Peter Parnell, and Allison Abner |
Ainsley Hayes is a fictional character on the television serial drama The West Wing. Played by Emily Procter, she is the Associate and later Deputy White House Counsel, a Republican who was hired by White House Chief of Staff Leo McGarry at the direction of President Bartlet.
Ainsley is a native of North Carolina. A lifelong Republican, her father was once chairman of the North Carolina Republican Party. Surprisingly, she attended Smith College (a notoriously liberal institution) and later went to Harvard Law School, where she met fellow Republican Clifford 'Cliff' Calley, whom she would later introduce to Donna Moss. She was also a member of the Young Republicans.
After law school, Ainsley clerked for conservative Supreme Court Justice Dreifort. She then worked as a conservative spokeswoman.
In 2000, shortly before the midterm elections, Ainsley participated in a debate with Deputy White House Communications Director Sam Seaborn on the TV show "Capitol Beat" (a “Meet the Press” style political discussion show). She called Sam out on his mislocation of a school district and proceeded to dominate the rest of the debate. White House Chief of Staff Leo McGarry and President Bartlet were impressed by her performance and offered Ainsley a job as an Associate White House Counsel.
Because she was a Republican, almost all at the White House were opposed to hiring her. Leo McGarry supported her, despite some scathing articles she had written criticizing Leo’s addictions to alcohol and pills when he was Labor Secretary. She did not hit it off with her boss - the unflinchingly liberal White House Counsel Lionel Tribbey - but she earned his grudging respect. Her first assignment was to correct a mistake by two staffers who mistakenly informed Congress that the White House did not have a document that it actually possessed. They rejected her efforts and sent some dead flowers with a note that said “bitch” to her office. Sam Seaborn fired the two staffers for their actions.
Ainsley was promoted to Deputy White House Counsel in order to ameloriate the damage done after President Bartlet made a public remark questioning the intelligence of Republican presidential nominee Robert Ritchie during the 2002 presidential campaign.
While a staunch conservative who opposes the Equal Rights Amendment and gun control, Ainsley is not an extremist. She is willing to work for Democrats and has an excellent working relationship with Deputy White House Communications Director Sam Seaborn. She was also terrified of meeting the unabashedly liberal President Bartlet, causing her to act quite strangely when Sam tried to arrange such a meeting.
Ainsley has a strong sense of duty (reinforced by her love for Gilbert and Sullivan operettas) that allows her to transcend party affiliation. She has an incredible appetite, and often steals Sam's food.
She disappeared from the show without explanation in 2003, only to be replaced by fellow Republican lawyer Joe Quincy. She was present for Leo McGarry's funeral in 2006, shortly after Matthew Santos' election to the presidency. She had been a fellow at the Hoover Institution for barely nine days when she asked Chief of Staff C.J. Cregg about serving as White House Counsel in the incoming Santos Administration.
