The selection of New Jersey and MetLife Stadium to host of the final of the 2026 World Cup in February – an announcement no one in the state knew was coming – led to cheers, hugs and one big celebratory leap from Gov. Phil Murphy.
And seemingly within seconds, it also led to Natalie Hamilton’s phone blowing up.
Hamilton, the then deputy press secretary who was in charge of communications for the event, had local, regional, national and global news and sports outlets wanting to hear from Murphy about how the state landed the world’s biggest sporting event.
“It was crazy,” Hamilton said. “It was the biggest mad dash that I’ve had on the job. I had incoming calls, left and right.”
And big decisions to make in a flash.
“We had to take advantage of the limited amount of time the governor can dedicate to each request after something that the whole world was watching,” she said. “And we had to balance the needs of everyone. We obviously wanted to tell the story to the local audience, but it was a chance for the governor to tell the story of New Jersey to the world.
“I quickly outlined all the buckets we needed to hit. In the first hour after the announcement, the governor did more than a dozen interviews with print journalists on the phone and TV spots remotely.”
Hamilton, who began interning with the governor’s communications team after her freshman year at the University of Delaware, working almost every possible job (she often was the person transcribing the governor’s daily COVID press events), had just recently been promoted to acting press secretary, filling in for someone on paternity leave.
In April, she was elevated to the formal role of press secretary.
In May, she celebrated her 24th birthday.
She is believed to be the youngest person to ever hold the position.
In a time when media exposure has never been more important – interviews that can make and break politicians – Murphy relies on Hamilton to be his lead spokesperson.
“Natalie is a talented communicator who has risen from intern to Press Secretary because of her singular work ethic and drive,” he said. “We’re proud to call her an integral member of our team.”
Hamilton, fulfilling the role of a behind-the-scenes star, credits the entire comms team.
“This is not about one person – it’s about everyone who is here,” she said.
Hamilton, however, is the go-to person when any reporter anywhere needs to get the thoughts of – or access to – the governor.
She recently spoke with ROI-NJ about her role. Here’s a look at the interview, edited slightly for space and clarity.
ROI-NJ: Let’s start with the beginning. You are only 24, but you are a veteran of the governor’s comms team. Your first internship came in the summer of 2019. How did this all come about?
Natalie Hamilton: I grew up in Lambertville, which is about 25 minutes from Trenton. So, there’s a large population of people, many of my friends’ parents, who work in Trenton. And both of my parents work in public service (her father works for a school agency and her mother works at a nonprofit) so I had been surrounded by people who worked for the state my entire life.
I knew the governor’s (then) speechwriter, Derek Roseman, because he was from Lambertville. The summer before I went into college, he told me to give him a ring if I was ever interested in working in state government. I did. That helped me land an internship for that June – and then I came back in the winter, right before COVID hit, taking advantage of the long break we get at Delaware. And then I just kept coming back; they never got rid of me.
ROI: The pandemic obviously was an enormous challenge for the government. What was your role in that – and what was it like to be a part of it?
NH: I had a very, very small role. I was only there during the summers and winter, and I did a lot of the transcription work. But it gave me a chance to see the importance of the comms team, led by Mahen Gunaratna, Dan Bryan and Alayna Alfaro Post. They were so dedicated and so impressive. It was an incredible experience to see that.
ROI: Sounds like you were hooked.
NH: From a young age, my parents had instilled in me the value of public service, but I was unsure of what that would be when I got to college. I was really lucky in the sense that I got an internship after my freshman year. It was meant to be exploratory, but I knew this is what I wanted to do after my first week in the governor’s office.
ROI: Serving multiple internships gave you a chance to do almost every job on the comms team – plus, you got to serve on the governor’s campaign team. How did those opportunities prepare you do this job?
NH: There’s not one part of the press operation that I haven’t done or experienced. I started by formatting the clips every day, writing the public schedule and writing a million press releases. So, when I eventually transitioned into press secretary, and supervising all of that work, there’s an inherent value in having done it.
It also taught me the intensity of the job and the team that takes to do it. Being a press assistant also is a 24/7 job. If something happens, you’re often the person that blasts out press release – but you’re working with everyone else. We all work together 24/7; I’m grateful to be part of a team that is committed to the work.
ROI: It also taught you about working the media. And we all know the relationship between the media and a political figure can be – we’ll politely say – complicated. Talk about dealing with the press: What is something you wish they knew?
NH: I think it would be how much we do appreciate them.
ROI: As a longtime member of the media, I’ll take a moment and pick my jaw up off the floor.
NH: Seriously. I know there are a lot of times where the press may not be happy with the comments that I give them or an answer that I have for them, but at the end of the day, I would say the main reason that I’m in this line of work is because I feel really passionately about trying to increase trust in government and the press is part of that.
Having joined this team around a pandemic era, I saw what media fragmentation can do as it relates to political polarization. People see something on Facebook or Tik Tok, and they take it as the truth, and that’s something that is really concerning to me as someone who’s in charge of communicating messages to the public,
I value my relationship with the press, because they’re doing something that is so essential as people are becoming less and less trusting of government. So, I have a lot of respect for the people that are still doing it and still fighting the good fight.
ROI: In all seriousness, the relationship isn’t always acrimonious. In fact, it’s almost always cordial and professional. And we understand that your job, like ours, truly is a 24/7 job. (This interview had to be sneaked into a rare 30-minute window when she knew the governor was occupied.) We know that it truly involves a lot of grunt work, but we’re guessing there are some cool things about it, too – yes?
NH: Having to carry around two cell phones and one laptop at all times can be tough, but it definitely comes with highs that I know I wouldn’t have had with any other job. There are incredible adrenaline rushes.
ROI: Give us a few?
NH: When we had the first meeting about the governor’s clemency initiative, when it was really just still in this idea form, to be able to sit at that table with a sitting governor and be part of a conversation about something that you know only he can do in this state – something that will have such tremendous impact – was a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
And when we went to London on the economic mission, I got to do press engagements with him in a foreign country and with media that I had never worked with before. That was an incredible experience, too.
ROI: Experience. You’ve certainly had a lot of it at a young age. And we didn’t even discuss the summer you drove around Mississippi, working for a gubernatorial candidate Brandon Presley. One thing you haven’t experienced is a change in an administration. Your work in the governor’s office almost certainly ends when a new governor – and a new comms team – arrives next January.
The good news: Someone with your experience and obvious work ethic would be highly valued in the private sector. Is that appealing – or would you still want to work in public service?
NH: I’ve been getting that question a lot lately. I’ll start by saying this: I love working for this governor. And the people I work with, are like a family to me. I speak to them more than I talk to my own family. So, when you’re dedicating that much of your time and your life to something 24/7, it’s hard to imagine doing it for – or with – another group.
I have not made any decisions about my future. I’m absolutely open to working in the private sector. I have to be. But I have to say, with my overall dedication to public service and how much I love the state, it’s hard to imagine leaving it.
