Geraldine Anne Ferraro was an American politician, diplomat, and attorney. She served in the United States House of Representatives from 1979 to 1985, and was the Democratic Party's nominee for vice president in the 1984 presidential election, running alongside Walter Mondale; this made her the first female vice-presidential nominee representing a major American political party. She was also a journalist, author, and businesswoman.
Patricia Ireland is an American administrator and feminist. She served as president of the National Organization for Women from 1991 to 2001 and published an autobiography, What Women Want, in 1996.
Mary Beth Cahill is an American political advisor who served as the campaign manager of the John Kerry 2004 presidential campaign. She was Kerry's second campaign manager, replacing Jim Jordan in November 2003, after Jordan was fired by Kerry. In February 2018, Cahill was named interim CEO of the Democratic National Committee.
Patricia Roberts Harris was an American politician, diplomat, and legal scholar. She served as the 6th United States secretary of housing and urban development from 1977 to 1979 and as the 13th United States secretary of health and human services from 1979 to 1981 under President Jimmy Carter. She previously served as the United States ambassador to Luxembourg from 1965 to 1967 under President Lyndon B. Johnson. Throughout her public career, Harris was a trailblazer for women and people of color to hold a number of positions, including the first African American woman and woman of color ever to serve in a presidential cabinet and the first woman and person of color appointed to two different presidential cabinet positions. She was the first African American HHS secretary and just the second black HUD secretary, as well as the second woman to lead either of those executive departments. Furthermore, she was the first black woman U.S. ambassador, the dean of a U.S. law school, and a member of a Fortune 500 company's board of directors. A member of the Democratic Party, she ran for mayor of the District of Columbia in the 1982 mayoral election but was defeated during the primaries, ultimately finishing second to incumbent mayor Marion Barry.
Susan Molinari is an American politician, company executive, journalist, and lobbyist from New York. A member of the Republican Party, she sat in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1990 to 1997, representing Staten Island for three terms. Molinari, who was considered a rising star in the party, was selected to deliver the keynote address at the 1996 Republican National Convention. However, the next year, she resigned from Congress to become a television journalist for CBS News. Later, she became a vice president for public policy at Google from 2012 to 2018.
Joseph Sill Clark Jr. was an American writer, lawyer and politician. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the 90th Mayor of Philadelphia from 1952 to 1956 and as a United States Senator from Pennsylvania from 1957 to 1969. Clark was the only Unitarian Universalist elected to a major office in Pennsylvania in the modern era.
Robert M. "Bob" Shrum is the director of the Center for the Political Future and the Carmen H. and Louis Warschaw Chair in Practical Politics at the University of Southern California, where he is a professor of political science in the Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences. He is a former American political consultant, who has worked on numerous Democratic campaigns, including as senior advisor to the Kerry-Edwards campaign in 2004 and to the Gore-Lieberman campaign in 2000. Shrum wrote the famous speech Ted Kennedy gave at the 1980 Democratic National Convention conceding to and supporting President Jimmy Carter. He has been described as "the most sought-after consultant in the Democratic Party." Shrum served as speechwriter to New York Mayor John V. Lindsay from 1970 to 1971, speechwriter to Senator George McGovern's 1972 presidential campaign and speechwriter and press secretary to Senator Edward M. Kennedy from 1980 to 1984 and political consultant until 2009.
Anita Finlay is an American film and television actress who played the recurring role of Dr. Nora Thompson on The Young and the Restless for seven years. Born, raised and trained as an actress in New York, Finlay's television credits include guest appearances on Grey's Anatomy, Perception, Castle, Brothers and Sisters, 24, Gilmore Girls, Judging Amy, The Guardian, Melrose Place, Matlock, L.A. Law and Hannah Montana. Finlay starred in a number of feature films and made-for-television movies including "Alternate Endings", "The Last Place on Earth", "Two Voices", "Prison of Secrets" and Visions of Murder. In addition, Finlay has done scores of commercial campaigns and worked in the theatre as a solo artist, writing and performing "The Devil Takes a Wife" to acclaim in Los Angeles theaters. She has also performed in regional theatres throughout the United States and had long running spokesperson contracts for a number of Fortune 500 companies.
Patrick Hayward Caddell was an American public opinion pollster and a political film consultant who served in the Carter administration. He worked for Democratic presidential candidates George McGovern in 1972, Jimmy Carter in 1976 and 1980, Gary Hart in 1984 (primary), Walter Mondale in 1984, Joe Biden in 1988, and Jerry Brown in 1992. He also worked for Mario Cuomo, Bob Graham, Michael Dukakis, Paul Simon, Ted Kennedy, Harold Washington, Andrew Romanoff and Donald Trump.
Morris Mike Medavoy is an American film producer and business executive. He is the co-founder of Orion Pictures, the former chairman of TriStar Pictures, the former head of production for United Artists, and the current chairman and CEO of Phoenix Pictures.
Rosa Brooks is an American law professor, journalist, author and commentator on foreign policy, U.S. politics and criminal justice. She is the Scott K. Ginsburg Professor of Law and Policy at Georgetown University Law Center. Brooks is also an adjunct scholar at West Point's Modern War Institute and a senior fellow at the New America Foundation. From April 2009 to July 2011, Brooks was a counselor to Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Michèle Flournoy.
Karen Ruth Bass is an American politician, social worker and former physician assistant who has served as the 43rd mayor of Los Angeles since 2022. A member of the Democratic Party, Bass previously served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2011 to 2022 and in the California State Assembly from 2004 to 2010, serving as speaker during her final Assembly term.
Stewart Alexis Alexander is an American democratic socialist politician, presidential nominee for the Socialist Party USA in the 2012 election, and former SPUSA nominee for Vice President of the United States in the 2008 election.
Steve Barr is an educator, political activist, and author, best known as a co-founder of Rock the Vote and founder of Green Dot Public Schools, a charter school organization in Los Angeles, California. He led Green Dot from 2000 to 2009. Barr also founded Future is Now Schools, a non-profit school organization that works on reforming schools from within.
The American left can refer to multiple concepts. It is sometimes used as a shorthand for groups aligned with the Democratic Party. At other times, it refers to groups that have sought egalitarian changes in the economic, political, and cultural institutions of the United States. Various subgroups with a national scope are active. Liberals and progressives believe that equality can be accommodated into existing capitalist structures, but they differ in their criticism of capitalism and on the extent of reform and the welfare state. Anarchists, communists, and socialists with international imperatives are also present within this macro-movement. Many communes and egalitarian communities have existed in the United States as a sub-category of the broader intentional community movement, some of which were based on utopian socialist ideals. The left has been involved in both the Democratic and Republican parties at different times, having originated in the Democratic-Republican Party as opposed to the Federalist Party.
Grace Montañez Davis was a political activist and served as the deputy mayor of Los Angeles from 1975 to 1990. She was the first Mexican-American woman to serve in this position.
The 2017 Los Angeles mayoral election was held on March 7, 2017, to elect the mayor of Los Angeles. Due to a change in the city's election calendar to align mayoral elections with statewide elections, the winner stood to serve a term of five years and six months instead of the usual four years.
Bill Zimmerman is an American political consultant and author who was an anti-war activist during the Vietnam War.
A special election to the United States House of Representatives for California's 25th congressional district was held March 3, 2020, the same day as the California presidential primaries. As no candidate received a majority, a runoff took place on May 12, 2020, between the top two finishers Christy Smith and Mike Garcia. Garcia's win was the first time Republicans flipped a Democratic-held House seat in California since 1998.
Lis Smith is an American political strategist affiliated with the Democratic Party. She is most well known for being the senior advisor for Pete Buttigieg's 2020 presidential campaign, deputy manager of Martin O'Malley's 2016 presidential campaign and the director of rapid response for Barack Obama's 2012 campaign. She has also directed communications and strategy for a number of other gubernatorial, mayoral and congressional campaigns.
