Promote to Remove: Cochran as Political Leverage
Plot Beats
The narrative micro-steps within this event
Toby and Sam pivot to ambassadorial reshuffling strategy, unveiling their plan to leverage Cochran's scandal to advance FEC nominations.
Bartlet reluctantly greenlights Cochran's removal for incompetence rather than scandal, preserving personal relationships while advancing political objectives.
Charlie's subtle reaction to Cochran's name hints at additional institutional knowledge, creating a quiet moment of dramatic irony.
Who Was There
Characters present in this moment
Externally obedient and professional, but internally uneasy and briefly affected by the moral weight of the order.
Charlie receives Bartlet's order to bring Ambassador Cochran to the Oval, acknowledges the instruction, and registers a small, visible flinch when Cochran's name is spoken — a brief physical sign that he perceives the personal fallout of the decision.
- • Execute the President's orders swiftly and without error.
- • Maintain professional composure while managing any private discomfort about the human cost.
- • Orders from the President must be carried out efficiently.
- • There is a human cost to institutional decisions, and even aides internalize that cost privately.
Controlled and businesslike with a low-heat urgency; protective of the President's political posture while wary of moral compromise.
Toby enters, confirms the State Department's concern about Cochran, and quickly aligns around creating plausible grounds or accepting the promotion plan; he supplies procedural framing and tacitly endorses a controlled, institutional fix.
- • Preserve message discipline and avoid optics that portray the administration as soft or incompetent.
- • Ensure the solution is defensible and administratively credible.
- • Language and plausible procedural rationales matter to public perception.
- • The State Department can manufacture or present acceptable reasons to reassign diplomats.
Not present to display emotion; inferred to be embarrassed, threatened professionally, and at risk of reputational damage.
Although absent from the room, Ambassador Ken Cochran functions as the event's human subject: Sam and Toby discuss his alleged affair and decide to move him through promotion and reassignment, making him the sacrificial piece in the administration's damage control.
- • (Inferred) Preserve his career and reputation if informed of the plan.
- • Avoid public scandal and personal humiliation.
- • (Inferred) That the State and administration will manage personnel moves in ways that can protect or sacrifice him.
- • (Inferred) That diplomatic protocol and promotions will be used to contain personal scandals.
Calmly pragmatic and almost clinical — focused on solving the problem rather than moralizing about it.
Sam arrives, listens to the polling/optics exchange, and offers the tactical solution — promote the offending ambassador rather than publicly firing him — explaining the chain‑move that will bury the scandal while preserving institutional stability.
- • Protect the administration's public standing and polling numbers.
- • Find a face-saving personnel solution that avoids public scandal and preserves relationships.
- • Institutional maneuvers (promotions/transfers) can neutralize scandals better than public punishments.
- • The political cost of a scandal can be mitigated by reshuffling personnel rather than admitting wrongdoing.
Objects Involved
Significant items in this scene
The memo is the catalytic artifact: repeatedly invoked as the alleged evidence that the administration favors drug legalization. It shapes the meeting's urgency, forces defensive messaging, and provides the rhetorical foil against which Bartlet and staff discuss personnel trades.
A cup of tea anchors Bartlet physically as he sits and reasons through geography and personnel costs. The tea punctuates his sitting posture and lends domestic, conversational intimacy to an otherwise tactical exchange.
Location Details
Places and their significance in this event
The Oval Office is the decision arena where institutional weight is concentrated: poll talk, personnel maneuvering, and the President's command converge into an order that will reshape diplomatic postings and manage scandal.
The Outer Oval Office functions as the transition space where Bartlet, C.J. and Charlie arrive and the informal prelude to the Oval meeting occurs — greetings, quick status checks, and the movement of people toward the decision chamber.
The U.S. Embassy in Bulgaria is named as Cochran's physical locus — the origin point for the personnel extraction and the site of the alleged affair. It functions as the remote node that the White House will pull an implicated ambassador from.
Narrative Connections
How this event relates to others in the story
"Toby's challenge about the asymmetry of question six in the poll leads to the later revelation of divergent expectations about the poll results."
"Bartlet's unease about appearing 'soft on drugs' immediately precedes C.J.'s defense of the White House stance in the press briefing."
"Bartlet's unease about appearing 'soft on drugs' immediately precedes C.J.'s defense of the White House stance in the press briefing."
"Bartlet's unease about appearing 'soft on drugs' immediately precedes C.J.'s defense of the White House stance in the press briefing."
Key Dialogue
"SAM: "You're not going to fire the ambassador. You're going to promote him.""
"TOBY: "We can create legitimate grounds for incompetence.""
"BARTLET: "I need to meet with Ambassador Cochran. He can be found in his office at the U.S Embassy in Bulgaria, or not. Either way, I'd like the State Department to put his ass on a plane and have it in this office tomorrow.""