Zack Exley
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Zack Exley (born December 5, 1969) is an American political and technology consultant.


Early life and education

Exley was raised in
West Hartford, Connecticut West Hartford is a town in Hartford County, Connecticut, United States, west of downtown Hartford. The population was 64,083 at the 2020 census. The town's popular downtown area is colloquially known as "West Hartford Center," or simply "The C ...
. He studied abroad at Shanxi Normal University before earning his B.A. in Social Thought and Political Economy from the
University of Massachusetts Amherst The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst, UMass) is a public research university in Amherst, Massachusetts and the sole public land-grant university in Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Founded in 1863 as an agricultural college, it ...
in 1993. He also attended the
John F. Kennedy School of Government The Harvard Kennedy School (HKS), officially the John F. Kennedy School of Government, is the school of public policy and government of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The school offers master's degrees in public policy, public ...
.


Career

Around the 2000 election controversy, Exley used a website to allow citizens to self-organize more than 100 protests around the United States. In 2004, he was the Director of Online Communications and Organizing on the
John Kerry 2004 presidential campaign The 2004 presidential campaign of John Kerry, the longtime U.S. senator from Massachusetts, began when he formed an exploratory committee on December 1, 2002. On September 2, 2003, he formally announced his candidacy for Democratic nomination. ...
, and directed internet operations for the
UK Labour Party The Labour Party is a political party in the United Kingdom that has been described as an alliance of social democrats, democratic socialists and trade unionists. The Labour Party sits on the centre-left of the political spectrum. In all gene ...
's re-election campaign in 2005. Exley served as the Chief Revenue Officer (formerly Chief Community Officer) at the
Wikimedia Foundation The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., or Wikimedia for short and abbreviated as WMF, is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization headquartered in San Francisco, California and registered as a charitable foundation under local laws. Best kno ...
from 2010 to 2013. He continued to provide contracted fundraising consultation until 2017. Before that, he worked at ThoughtWorks, a global IT consultancy. He is also the co-founder and former president of the
New Organizing Institute The New Organizing Institute (NOI) was a progressive grassroots organization located in Washington, D.C., until it dissolved in 2015. Founded in 2005 by Judith Freeman and Zack Exley, the non-profit organization was responsible for training many ...
, a progressive political technology training organization. ''
Politico ''Politico'' (stylized in all caps), known originally as ''The Politico'', is an American, German-owned political journalism newspaper company based in Arlington County, Virginia, that covers politics and policy in the United States and intern ...
'' reported in August 2015 that Exley had joined the 2016 Bernie Sanders presidential campaign as a senior advisor responsible for digital communications. He co-founded the
Justice Democrats Justice Democrats is an American progressive political action committee founded on January 23, 2017, by former leaders from the Bernie Sanders 2016 presidential campaign Saikat Chakrabarti and Zack Exley, as well as political commentators Kyle ...
and
Brand New Congress Brand New Congress is an American political action committee with the mission to elect hundreds of new progressive congressional representatives in line with the campaign's political platform. Background Brand New Congress is a volunteer-le ...
. Exley was Organizing Director at
MoveOn.org MoveOn (formerly known as MoveOn.org) is a progressive public policy advocacy group and political action committee. Formed in 1998 around one of the first massively viral email petitions, MoveOn has since grown into one of the largest grassroot ...
during the group's campaign to prevent the
Iraq War {{Infobox military conflict , conflict = Iraq War {{Nobold, {{lang, ar, حرب العراق (Arabic) {{Nobold, {{lang, ku, شەڕی عێراق (Kurdish languages, Kurdish) , partof = the Iraq conflict (2003–present), I ...
, and during its controversial involvement with the
Howard Dean 2004 presidential campaign The 2004 presidential campaign of Howard Dean, 79th Governor of Vermont, began when he formed an exploratory committee to evaluate a presidential election campaign on May 31, 2002. Dean then formally announced his intention to compete in the Demo ...
. He was criticized for "rigging" the "MoveOn Primary" in favor of Dean, a charge the group rejected. Prior to working for MoveOn, Exley created the political parody website, GWBush.com, as well as cnndn.com, a site that parodied financial reporting. Both sites attracted legal action by the Bush's 2000 election campaign and
CNN CNN (Cable News Network) is a multinational cable news channel headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable news channel, and presently owned by ...
, respectively. CNN successfully closed cnndn.com, but legal action from the Bush campaign led to increased publicity for Exley's site and set legal precedent that has allowed political websites to operate without
Federal Election Commission The Federal Election Commission (FEC) is an independent regulatory agency of the United States whose purpose is to enforce campaign finance law in United States federal elections. Created in 1974 through amendments to the Federal Election Cam ...
regulation. In response to GWBush.com, then-candidate
George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...
called Exley a "garbage man" and said he believed the website should be forced to be shut down, explaining "There ought to be limits to freedom." Exley previously managed ''Revolution in Jesusland'', a blog that sought to create dialog between the secular left and groups within
Evangelical Christianity Evangelicalism (), also called evangelical Christianity or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide Interdenominationalism, interdenominational movement within Protestantism, Protestant Christianity that affirms the centrality of being "bor ...
that promote economic and social justice as a matter of faith. After the
2016 United States Presidential election The 2016 United States presidential election was the 58th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 8, 2016. The Republican ticket of businessman Donald Trump and Indiana governor Mike Pence defeated the Democratic ticket ...
, Exley,
Saikat Chakrabarti Saikat Chakrabarti (born January 12, 1986) is a political advisor and software engineer. He was formerly chief of staff to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the U.S. representative from New York's 14th congressional district representing portions of The ...
, a former fellow Bernie Sanders presidential campaign executive,
Kyle Kulinski Kyle Edward Kulinski (born January 31, 1988) is an American political commentator and media host. Kulinski is the host and producer of ''The Kyle Kulinski Show'' on his YouTube channel ''Secular Talk'' and is a co-host with his partner Krystal ...
of ''Secular Talk'' and
Cenk Uygur Cenk Kadir Uygur ( ; ; born March 21, 1970) is a Turkish-American progressive political commentator, media host, attorney, journalist, and politician. Uygur is the creator of ''The Young Turks'', an American left-wing, sociopolitical, progressi ...
of ''
The Young Turks ''The Young Turks'' (TYT) is an American progressive news commentary show on YouTube that additionally appears on selected television channels. TYT serves as the flagship program of the TYT Network, a multi-channel network of associated web se ...
'' created the
Justice Democrats Justice Democrats is an American progressive political action committee founded on January 23, 2017, by former leaders from the Bernie Sanders 2016 presidential campaign Saikat Chakrabarti and Zack Exley, as well as political commentators Kyle ...
to reform the
Democratic Party Democratic Party most often refers to: *Democratic Party (United States) Democratic Party and similar terms may also refer to: Active parties Africa *Botswana Democratic Party *Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea *Gabonese Democratic Party *Demo ...
and challenge President
Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...
. Exley co-founded Middle Seat, which worked extensively with Justice Democrats.


References


External links


Revolution in Jesusland(.com)
- Exley's blog on new Evangelical politics. Archived from th
original
on Aug 22, 2008.
Exley's blog posts at Huffington Post
1969 births Living people American political consultants Wikimedia Foundation staff members {{Improve categories, date=July 2021