Senior Leadership
Jonathan Parker
Political Director
Jonathan Parker is the political director at EMILY’s List, leading the department that works directly with pro-choice Democratic women candidates across the country and advising the EMILY’s List president on politics and strategy regarding these campaigns.
As political director, Jonathan oversees the work of campaign services, the Political Opportunity Program (POP) and the training department. The campaign services staff members assist candidates with campaign operations and strategy. POP recruits, trains and aids pro-choice Democratic women running for state and local office. The training department also gives future campaign managers, finance directors, researchers and field and press staff the skills to work on Democratic campaigns. One particular program, Campaign Corps, trains a select group of recent college graduates and places them on targeted progressive Democratic campaigns.
Before joining EMILY’s List in 2007, Jonathan spent four years at the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), where he managed and coordinated health care reform efforts for the union, including serving as national campaign director for Americans for Health Care, a national grassroots advocacy campaign for quality affordable health care for everyone. In the 2002 election cycle, Jonathan was the political director for Senator Tom Daschle’s DASHPAC. From 1997 to 2001, Jonathan worked for EMILY’s List, where he served as a liaison to candidates and assisted campaigns in developing campaign plans and election strategies. From 1993 to 1997, Jonathan was a polling analyst with The Feldman Group; and prior to that he worked at the AFL-CIO.
Jonathan holds an M.A. in history from the University of Maryland at College Park and a B.A. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.