NEW YORK — Blue State, a leading creative agency and strategic advisor for purpose-driven organizations, today launched a new, multidisciplinary political practice that prioritizes people-powered movements that inspire and turn out voters in races up and down the ballots across the country.
Blue State Campaigns will provide multi-channel fundraising, strategic communications, paid media, and general consulting to the clients they serve. While Blue State will continue to work with nonpartisan institutions, this group will work exclusively with Democratic and progressive campaigns, candidates, and organizations across the country, working to tackle big issues with big solutions.
“Democrats need to run sharp campaigns on big ideas that match the scale of the problems working families are facing,” said Joe Rospars, Founder & CEO of Blue State. “Blue State Campaigns will help run smart, integrated programs rooted in progressive values that focus a campaign’s time and money on reaching the voters and mobilizing the grassroots supporters they need to win.”
Blue State got its start on the campaign trail, innovating the use of digital technology to open up the democratic process and revolutionize the way campaigns interact with voters. Founded in 2004 by veterans of the Howard Dean campaign, Blue State has been an integral part of five presidential cycles, including some of the most forward-thinking campaigns of the last two decades — from Barack Obama’s 2008 and 2012 winning presidential runs, to Elizabeth Warren’s most recent 2020 Presidential bid.
The practice will be led by Tessa Simonds, a veteran organizer and campaign strategist who most recently served as Senior Advisor for Digital Organizing on the Biden-Harris National Coordinated Campaign at the Democratic National Committee. In this role, Simonds helped reimagine the approach to digital organizing and grassroots mobilization at scale in the battleground states, resulting in a record-breaking voter contact program with nearly 700 million voter contact attempts made in the four months leading up to Election Day. A progressive changemaker for a decade, Simonds has previously held roles as Director of Grassroots Mobilization on the Elizabeth Warren Presidential campaign, managing a staff of more than 64 people at 13 offices across the country, and launched the Mobilization team as Digital Director at the Democratic National Committee.
“For nearly 20 years, Blue State has helped redefine how political campaigns are run and transformed our understanding of how to put people first in campaigns and organizations,” said Simonds. “I’m honored to build upon this history by joining this team of organizers, strategists, and communications experts and help deepen our engagement with political campaigns by bringing new organizing tactics and tools to our clients.”
In addition to Simonds, Blue State welcomes Ben Page-Gil, as Vice President of Fundraising. Page-Gil brings nearly a decade of experience at agencies, party committees, and political campaigns, raising almost a quarter of a billion dollars for Democratic candidates and campaigns — more than $115 million of that raised on the Warren for President campaign alone, where Ben’s team innovated an integrated grassroots fundraising program never before seen in campaigns.
Blue State leadership who will be involved in Blue State Campaigns includes Camonghne Felix, Head of Strategic Communications; Eric Reif, Senior Vice President, Paid Media; Mike Conlow, Head of Technology Consulting; Stephen Muller, Head of Growth Strategy; Rob Laub, Chief Financial Officer; and Justine Boon, Head of Inclusion and People Operations.
The practice will also tout progressive campaign and organizing veterans at Blue State including Rachel Kopilow, Vice President of Strategic Communications and Creative Director; Christopher Huntley, Vice President of Strategic Communications; Matt Compton, Senior Vice President of Mobilization & Strategy; Esther Chan, Senior Video Editor; Isabel Farrington, Senior Video Producer; Judy Su, Associate Creative Director; Lauren Tsuboyama, Vice President of Strategic Communications; Lissette Gomez, Director of Executive Operations; Mike Marotti, IT Director; Sienna Svob, Developer; William Tomasko, Editorial Director; and Yena Oh, Senior Video Producer.