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Board of Directors

Robert L. Borosage, Chairman

Robert Borosage is currently the president of the Institute for America's Future and co-director of the Campaign for America's Future. He is acting chair for the American Progressive Caucus Policy Foundation. Borosage is a contributing editor of The Nation and a regular columnist on The Huffington Post. He writes regularly on economic and national security issues. Borosage is founder of Progressive Majority, and the Campaign for New Priorities, a nonprofit organization calling for post-Cold War reinvestment in America. He served as director of the Institute for Policy Studies where he remains as a board member. He has also served as an issues advisor to many progressive political campaigns, including those of Paul Wellstone, Barbara Boxer and Carole Moseley Braun. In addition, he was senior issues advisor for the 1988 Jesse Jackson Campaign. Borosage is a graduate of Yale Law School and holds a master's degree in international relations from George Washington University.

Karen Ackerman

Karen Ackerman, Political Director of the AFL-CIO, has been active in the Labor Movement for more than 30 years. In the early 70's, she organized hospital workers in Philadelphia and went on to organize clerical and white-collar workers for District 65 UAW. She later joined the CWA organizing clerical and telephone workers. In 1986, the New York State Public Employees Federation, a 60,000 member state workers local affiliated with the AFT and SEIU, tapped her as Political Director.

As campaign manager for Lydia Velazquez in 1992, Ackerman ran a successful campaign against incumbent Steven Solarz. She became Chief of Staff for Congresswoman Velazquez and remained in that position until 1996, when Steve Rosenthal asked her to direct the Labor '96 program. In March of 2003, Karen was named Political Director of the AFL-CIO and put together the largest labor grassroots political program.

Beth Broderick

Beth Broderick is a veteran of stage and screen. She is best known for her portrayal of Aunt Zelda in the long-running hit TV series "Sabrina the Teenage Witch." In 1984, she founded MOMENTUM which was only the second AIDS program in existence at that time and produced numerous star-studded benefits and secured funding from a variety of sources. She was a founding member of the Celebrity Action Council for City Light Women's Rehabilitation Program and continues to provide resources for the Good Shepherd Home for battered women and children. Broderick is an active volunteer and fundraiser in Los Angeles for many political campaigns, including the campaigns of Walter Mondale, Bill Clinton and Howard Dean.

Edmund D. Cooke, Jr.

Edmund Cooke practices law in the Employment and Labor Section of Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP's Washington, DC, office. He counsels and represents employers on a wide array of employment issues such as Title VII (sex, race and other types of discrimination), the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act and the Fair Labor Standards Act. He focuses on diversity counseling and audits and served for five years as a member of the task force designated to oversee Coca-Cola Inc.'s compliance with consent decree resolving a lawsuit alleging race discrimination at the company.

Ed spent more than eight years in counsel positions at the U.S. House of Representatives, advising and consulting with congressional committees and legislative staff throughout both houses of Congress regarding employment discrimination, civil rights, labor relations and other related matters. During that time he oversaw all federal agencies dealing with employment discrimination law and regulations. He also directed the preparation and enactment of all legislation and budgetary matters relating to civil rights laws and the enforcement of those laws.

Lawrence E. Hess

Lawrence Hess has been active in progressive politics and an advocate for civil rights and improving education in southern California since the mid 1960s. From 1988-2002, Hess served on the board of directors of Instituto De Padres (Parent Institute for Quality Education), an organization dedicated to helping parents assist their children scholastic achievement and life skills. Each year, the Parent Institute provides classes for over 30,000 parents. Hess also remains actively engaged in progressive politics, not just in Southern California, but across the country.

Julie Martinez Ortega

Before joining American Rights at Work, Julie Martínez Ortega was a Kerr White Visiting Scholar with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. She also practiced civil rights litigation with Hadsell & Stormer, Inc. of Los Angeles, California, and worked on Capitol Hill as a Special Assistant to Senator Alan Cranston. She is a graduate of Stanford University, the UCLA School of Law, and the Heller Graduate School of Brandeis University. She is a member of the California Bar Association.

Tom Matzzie

Tom Matzzie is a progressive political and media strategist. He is recent founder and chair of Accountable America. Tom has worked in progressive politics for more than a decade - with MoveOn.org, the AFL-CIO, Campaign for America's Future and campaigns at the presidential and statewide level. At MoveOn, he created ground-breaking campaigns on corruption and the war in Iraq that set the stage for the 2006 Democratic takeover. The MoveOn 2006 election program successfully targeted for defeat 29 out of 36 Republicans. The Politico wrote that the intensity of Tom's campaigning, "rattled the entire Republican caucus." The New York Times Magazine said of his work on Iraq that they are to progressives, "...what the NRA is to the Right." Tom was named one of the "Forty Under Forty to Watch" by Washingtonian Magazine for his role as a leader in the emerging new politics.

Steve Phillips

Steve Phillips' has been an advocate for civil rights and education since his undergraduate years at Stanford, where he helped build a coalition of students, faculty and staff that pushed Stanford to make major changes in innovations in multi-cultural curriculum and student services for students of color. Phillips continued his public service after graduating from college, initially by working with a public interest law firm, and later by running for the San Francisco Board of Education at the age of 28. As a School Board Member-including a year as President-Phillips was instrumental in saving an early childhood education program, reducing class sizes, and making San Francisco the first school district in the country to incorporate books by writers of color into the required literature curriculum. After earning his law degree from Hastings College, Phillips started his own firm where he practiced civil rights and employment discrimination law. He has written nearly 100 columns and essays published in newspapers across the country, has appeared on multiple cable television shows, and has served as a commentator on BayTV and been a guest on KQED's Forum as well as appearing on KGO Radio and BBC radio.

Jack Polidori

Jack Polidori is the Director of Legislation & Political Organizing for the Delaware State Education Association. Polidori has nearly 30 years of experience in campaigns, lobbying, and consulting. During the 2004 cycle, Polidori served as the Political Director for Service Employees International Union where he managed the political department and the $12 million SEIU PAC. Polidori worked extensively with the National Education Association from 1997-2003 in government relations developing, coordinating, and conducting opinion research and analysis. He is acknowledged as a trusted education policy advisor and political strategist, with an extensive history with the Maryland State Teachers Association, North Carolina Association of Educators, and the Massachusetts Teachers Association.

Fran Rodgers


Fran Rodgers is widely recognized as a leader in addressing simultaneous labor force and business changes and was a founder of the work/life industry. Ms. Rodgers founded WFD (formerly Work/Family Directions) in 1983, where she remains the CEO. At WFD, Rodgers assisted blue chip, global corporations in igniting and sustaining employee commitment to business results. In 1994, she was a national winner of the Ernst and Young/Merrill Lynch Entrepreneur of the Year contest. In 1996, she was named one of the 25 most influential working mothers in the United States by Working Mother magazine.

Jon Youngdahl


Jon Youngdahl is the National Political Director for the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) with responsibility for coordinating SEIU's electoral operations and working to increase member involvement and public support for SEIU's endorsed candidates. Before joining SEIU's national staff in 2002, Youngdahl was the Executive Director of the Minnesota State Council of the SEIU, were he was responsible for coordinating the joint membership growth and political and legislative campaigns of SEIU's four Local Unions in Minnesota. He also served as the International Coordinator of the Steelworkers' Health Care Workers Council and worked as a corporate campaign coordinator for the United Steelworkers of America. An experienced veteran of Minnesota politics, Youngdahl served as the Campaign Manager for the Hatch for Governor Campaign in the fall of 2006, Mike Freeman's 1998 gubernatorial campaign, and Senator Satveer Chaudhary's upset victory in his inaugural State House race against incumbent Rep. Skip Carlson (at the time, Rep. Chaudhary was the first Asian Indian elected to a state legislature in the United States).