The Electables

Amy Spitalnick, Executive Director of Integrity First for America, is committed to holding those accountable who threaten longstanding principles of our democracy. Her current mission is Sines v. Kessler, the lawsuit filed by a coalition of Charlottesville community members against the Nazis and white supremacists responsible for the violence. In this episode, we discuss the case and hear more about extremist groups and their tactics for spreading hate.

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Interested in media buying? Laura Kollappallil and Will Flohr of Assembly take us into the details of media buying. We hear about traditional vs digital and other ways candidates are using media to reach voters. 

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Andre Banks

Founder + CEO

Andre Banks is founder and CEO of A/B Partners, a leading creative practice staffed by people of color, women and queer people bringing to life groundbreaking communications strategies in the #BlackLivesMatter era. A/B Partners is a fully integrated, data-driven agency providing communications strategy, brand positioning, content-driven message and audience testing and multi-channel media outreach. Andre has been leading campaigns for over 20 years and currently serves as the chair of the board at Color Of Change, the largest racial justice organization in the U.S. Prior to starting A/B, Andre was EVP for Social Impact & Philanthropy at Berlin Rosen, a leading national public relations and strategic communications firm. Andre is also co-founder of AllOut, a global organization advocating for the social acceptance of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. He was also a founding partner at leading social impact agency Purpose.

Ashley Bryant

Principal, A/B Partners

After 12+ years of a unique professional career of brand building, digital marketing, and political strategy—Ashley sits at the intersection of culture, politics, and activism. After serving as the Ohio Digital Director for the 2012 re-election campaign of President Barack Obama, she left the private sector to focus her efforts on building political power in the communities that need it the most. Prior to A/B, Ashley was a VP at 270 Strategies, Federal Digital Director at MoveOn and has advised several non-profits, and campaigns on strategic engagement and political mobilization as an independent consultant encouraging action through integrated online and offline strategies. She is also currently an Advisor to Higher Heights for America and Higher Heights for America PAC, the only political action committee exclusively dedicated to electing more progressive Black women from the federal level to citywide Mayors.

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CEO of the 2020 Democratic National Convention Committee joins The Electables to discuss the changes to the convention due to Coronavirus, some of his favorite convention memories, and what to expect in August.

Cornell Belcher is the President of Brilliant Corners Research and Strategies. He joins Doug Thornell to discuss several topics ranging from the 2020 election to race and politics. They touch on the messaging around defunding the police and how that will translate at the polls.

Cornell Belcher is President of Brilliant Corners Research & Strategies, a published author (A Black Man in the White House), political contributor to NBC/MSNBC, and one of the premier strategists in national progressive politics as well as in the rebranding of corporate America. Cornell served as Pollster for the DNC under Chairman Howard Dean making him the first minority to lead in that role for either national Party. He also served on the polling team for both groundbreaking Obama presidential campaigns. Over the years, Cornell has worked with both Senate and House Democrats as Senior Political Advisor to the DSCC in the 2002 cycle and Special Projects Director for the DCCC in the 2000 cycle. Cornell also served as Women VOTE! Coordinator for EMILY’s List in the 1998 cycle, helping to put together communication and GOTV operations targeting women voters all over the country.

Cornell is an experienced hand at campaign politics and has years of expertise in quantitative and qualitative research, message development, and product and behavioral insight. Founding brilliant corners in 2002, he is considered the vanguard for demographic trends among the emerging younger and browner America. In 2008 and 2012, youth and minority voters over-indexed and changed the face of the electorate helping not only President Obama, but progressive candidates and issues up and down the ballot; indeed in 2012 African American voter turnout surpassed that of whites for the first time in history.  Both historic watershed moments that greatly depended on Cornell’s nonconformist contributing work. 

As the pollster for the Democratic National Committee, he was able to ignore beltway criticisms and take the national Party’s research into previously unchartered directions, exploring how best to challenge Republicans’ strengths among voters in supposedly untouchable "red states," particularly "faith" or "values first" voters. Under Governor Dean’s leadership, Cornell helped to construct a savvy framework for the visionary 50 State Strategy that expanded the Democratic footprint on the electoral map and ultimately produced a Democratic realignment. Asked about Cornell’s role, Governor Dean was quoted in the Washington Post as saying that the research conducted by brilliant corners for the DNC was "the best poll [he'd] seen in ten years."

On this episode of the Electables, Doug is joined by Jamal Simmons, CBS News analyst and reporter. Jamal worked for U.S. President Bill Clinton and was an advisor to President Barack Obama’s historic 2008 campaign and White House. Today, he and Doug discuss how the political landscape is impacted by recent Black Lives Matter protests and how race is present when working for a campaign or any organization.

Learn more about Jamal here: http://jamalsimmons.com and follow him on Twitter: https://twitter.com/JamalSimmons

Jason Rosenbaum is the president of SKDK Digital. He joins the Electables to discuss how digital outreach has changed political advertising and fundraising through the years, which party has a stronger digital strategy, and how the Biden and Trump campaigns are employing these strategies.

Guy Cecil, chairman of Priorities USA, joins the Electables to discuss the upcoming 2020 election and the strategies Priorities USA are taking to beat Trump.