CN4 is a Democratic political consulting firm that helps progressive candidates and causes win. We have helped elect Governors, Senators, Members of Congress and countless state legislators. Our clients have included labor unions such as affiliates of NEA, AFSCME, SEIU, UFCW and progressive organizations such as Planned Parenthood, NARAL, Win Win, LCV affiliates and many others.

I founded the Institute for a Democratic Future (IDF) in 1997 and served as it's first Executive Director through 2001. Each year, IDF selects 32 young people ages 21-36 in Washington State and puts them through an intensive 6 month political leadership development program. I developed the curriculum, raised the start up capital for the organization and conducted the operations through the start-up phase. In the last 20 years, the organization has graduated nearly 500 young people, including U.S. Rep Derek Kilmer, Lt. Gov. Cyrus Habib, State Sens. Marko Liias, Derek Stanford, Kevin Van de Wege, State Reps. Lauren Davis, Kristine Reeves, Mary Fosse, Joe Timmons and Emily Wicks, campaign managers, legislative and congressional staff, non-profit, union and business leaders. After 25 years I left the board of the organization.

As National Political Director, I directly managed up to 8 state offices (AZ, CA, CO, MN, OH, PA, WA, WI), a $1 million + budget and 24 staff positions from coast-to-coast. Progressive Majority is a national organization that recruits, trains and elects candidates for down ballot offices nationally that will form the farm team for the progressive movement. During my tenure, we fielded 342 candidates; took control of WI Assembly, OH State House and 16 other governments across the country. My responsibilities included staff hiring, firing, training, coaching, strategic planning, budgets, fundraising, crisis management and new state launches. This role also means that I play a strong role in ensuring program replication and resource sharing, and I authored the first comprehensive program manual. I also play an active role on development, and help identify, cultivate and raise money from major individual donors and organized labor, and directly raised over $500,000 to support programming. As a member of senior management team, I help develop overall organizational vision, goals and innovations for the organization. Finally, I frequently represent the organization in major training and public speaking roles, including at Netroots Nation, Americas Future Now!, Take Back America and on behalf various state political and labor organizations.

In 2004, Progressive Majority expanded its operations from strictly federal into state and local elections by starting pilot programs in three states. I was hired as one of these original three state directors.I led the start-up program from inception of organization in Washington state and had the top candidate win rate across the organization from 2004-2007. During this time, I recruited, trained, funded and elected over 100 candidates and prioritized diversity; more than one-third of candidates elected were people of color. Over four years, I grew the office from one to four staff; I led and directed staff of four in client services, new campaign development and organizational growth. And, I directly fundraised more than $500,000 for organization and $200,000 in funds for candidates.

At the time I came to TFK, we were charged with expanding the grassroots and field operations department in order to support a major push on federal and state tobacco-control legislation.In this role, I managed a team of in-state lobbyists and field organizers in AK, FL, GA, IA, IN, IL, ME, MT, MO, NY, NJ, OR, PA, UT and VT targeting U.S. Senators and Members of Congress. My department had a $750,000 annual budget, as well as staff and consultant management responsibilities. We worked on numerous pieces of federal legislation, including FDA regulation of tobacco products, regulation of internet tobacco sales as well as appropriations for the Department of Justice tobacco lawsuit, which the Bush Administration was attempting to defund. During this time, I was designated the lead public health staff to defeat S. 274 (2003) the “Class Action Reform Bill" which lost in the U.S. Senate by one vote.In addition, I managed the national online grassroots membership program, and increased membership from 30,000 to 400,000 members. Our advocacy efforts generated more than 1 million letters to elected officials.

After the partnership break up at FDR Services where I worked from 1995-1998, I went with Blair Butterworth and joined him in a boutique political consulting practice with clients throughout the Western United States.During this period, I managed 20-30 accounts per year; took lead on over half. I wrote detailed page strategic plans for political and public relations clients, and developed concepts and copy for direct mail, brochures, fundraising and broadcast advertising.In the 2000 cycle, we landed a number of large direct mail contracts for the Gore/Lieberman campaign, and I was responsible for writing, designing and production of more than 4 million pieces of direct mail in one year.During this period, our clients included WA Governor Gary Locke, Gore/Lieberman Campaign, Harborview Hospital, EMILY’s List, SEIU, NARAL, Democratic National Committee and the Washington State Democrats.