No10 in secret bid to recruit Obama aides to help beat Cameron

Staff from No10 have approached Mr Obama’s US Democratic Party to discuss whether his polling and strategy chiefs could help Mr Brown defeat David Cameron.

The move is certain to inflame tensions between Mr Brown and Republican Presidential contender John McCain after the Prime Minister praised Mr Obama in a magazine article last week.

Adviser: David Muir (centre) made the approach

It is understood the approach to the Obama camp was made by former advertising executive David Muir, hired by Mr Brown earlier this year in an attempt to revive his political fortunes. The Mail on Sunday has been told that Mr Muir was responsible for approving the controversial article in which Mr Brown paid tribute to Mr Obama, without even referring to Mr McCain.

This newspaper can also disclose that a group of key Labour figures have been meeting in secret for several months to work on the party’s manifesto. Mr Muir, together with Brownite Cabinet Ministers Douglas Alexander and Ed Miliband, and Tony Blair’s polling guru Philip Gould, are said to have produced a first draft of Mr Brown’s ‘war book’. It sets out detailed plans for how Mr Brown will target ‘slick salesman’

Mr Cameron in the run-up to polling day, not expected until 2010.

Today’s disclosure that Mr Brown is hoping to sign up members of Mr Obama’s team after the American election in November could have serious consequences for Anglo-US relations if, as many pollsters are now predicting, Mr McCain wins.

Mr Brown has had links with the Democrats for decades. The Prime Minister is a long-time admirer of failed Presidential challenger Hillary Clinton and it is not the first time he has turned to Democrat allies for help.

Last year, he had dinner with three of the party’s most senior spin-doctors of recent times, Bob Shrum, Mark Penn and Stan Greenberg.

He asked them how he could recover from his disastrous decision not to hold a snap autumn General Election. For several months Mr Shrum even had a desk in No10.

However, trying to headhunt Democrat aides weeks before the most keenly contested US election for many years is far more sensitive.

Downing Street last night refused to respond to questions about Mr Muir’s role in the magazine article which praised Mr Obama and denied all knowledge of an attempt to recruit Democrat staff.

A spokesman for Mr Muir said he  had held talks with Mr Obama’s chief adviser, David Axelrod, during the Presidential hopeful’s recent visit to London. But the spokesman denied there was a suggestion that Mr Obama’s aides could work on Labour’s election campaign.