EMILYs List Announces Leadership Changes

For Immediate Release 
December 10, 2020

EMILYs List Announces Leadership Changes as Stephanie Schriock Departs after More than a Decade as President, Ellen Malcolm to Become Chair Emerita, Rebecca Haile Elected as Board Chair

WASHINGTON, D.C. — After a second consecutive record-breaking cycle, EMILYs List announced several leadership changes today, including EMILYs List President Stephanie Schriock stepping down in spring 2021 after 11 years in charge. In addition, EMILYs List Founder and Board Chair Ellen Malcolm is becoming the Chair Emerita and EMILYs List board member Rebecca Haile was elected Board Chair. EMILYs List’s board also voted to form a search committee and move to the next steps in finding a new president.

This change in leadership comes as EMILYs List is at its strongest position yet, following two record cycles and the incredible growth of Democratic women running for office. With Stephanie at the helm, EMILYs List has raised more than $460 million for the organization and our candidates and spent $160 million in independent expenditures. During her tenure, EMILYs List endorsed more than 1,800 women, elected nearly 1,000 women up and down the ballot, and trained more than 14,000 women. Following the explosive growth of women reaching out to EMILYs List for help in running, Schriock led the expansion of our state and local and training programs, including our online Training Center, and the creation of Run to Win, our national recruitment and training campaign. 

“It’s been an amazing 11 years and I’m so proud of what we’ve accomplished. We built a great team of professionals led today by our superb Executive Director, Emily Cain. We won races the pundits said couldn’t be won, put Democrats back in charge of the House in 2018, grew our digital and financial army and created a sea change for women in American politics. Women responded by marching, making phone calls, knocking on doors, and running for office in record numbers. Now it’s time for me to try new things and seek new challenges – and I will forever be indebted to our founder Ellen Malcolm, our board and our incredible and talented staff,” said Stephanie Schriock, EMILY’S List president.

Ellen Malcolm will become the EMILYs List Chair Emerita after founding EMILYs List 35 years ago, serving as president for 25 years and Board Chair for 11 more. Ellen is a veteran Democratic activist and fundraiser who began her career as an organizer at Common Cause and later served as press secretary for the National Women’s Political Caucus and in the White House in 1980 as the press secretary for President Jimmy Carter’s special assistant for consumer affairs. Ellen helped create and served as president for America Coming Together, a nationwide organization dedicated to empowering and mobilizing voters and was instrumental in the creation of America Votes. Ellen is the author of When Women Win: EMILYs List and the Rise of Women in American Politics and she serves as Board Chair for the National Partnership for Women & Families and a member of the National Park Foundation Board of Directors. 

“I've always been proud of the ability of EMILY's List to evolve. We've grown from a fundraising concept into a powerful full-service political organization.  We've also successfully changed leaders and staff and grown bigger and better with every change.  Stephanie has done a phenomenal job leading EMILY's List for the past 11 years. I've been proud to stand at her side as Chair of the Board. Now we will change leaders again–and I am confident this current evolution will result in positive changes for years to come. I'm so glad Rebecca will be the new Chair because she has the skills, commitment, and vision to guide us through this next transition. I'm eager to stay on the board and assist her in any way possible,” said Ellen Malcolm, EMILYs List’s founder and Chair Emerita.

EMILYs List’s new Board Chair Rebecca Haile is an entrepreneur in business and philanthropy. She is the co-founder and executive director of Ethiopia Education Initiatives, Inc., that seeks to provide world-class educational opportunities for talented Ethiopian students and has already started its first school in central Ethiopia. Rebecca is also a Senior Advisor at Foros, an independent strategic and M&A advisory boutique firm she helped establish in 2009. Rebecca is a graduate of Williams College and Harvard Law School, where she was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. She is the author of Held at a Distance: My Rediscovery of Ethiopia, a memoir of her return to Ethiopia after her family’s forced exile following the 1974 revolution and 25 years in the United States. Rebecca is a board member of the Brearley School, an independent K-12 girls’ school in New York City and a former Trustee of Freedom House, a human rights organization.

“Ellen Malcolm and Stephanie Schriock have built EMILYs List into a political powerhouse that has elected hundreds of women and had an incredible impact on our government, our politics, and our community. I have been lucky to work with both of them and am honored to follow Ellen in leading this organization forward into its next chapter. Representation matters, and helping a diverse group of women break glass ceilings in every community and every office is a goal that is so important to me. I look forward to working with the staff, the board, and our next president to change the face of American politics for generations to come,” said Rebecca Haile, EMILYs List Board Chair.

EMILYs List, the nation’s largest resource for women in politics, has raised over $700 million to elect pro-choice Democratic women candidates. With a grassroots community of over five million members, EMILY's List helps Democratic women win competitive campaigns – across the country and up and down the ballot – by recruiting and training candidates, supporting and helping build strong campaigns, researching the issues that impact women and families, running nearly $50 million in independent expenditures in the last cycle alone, and turning out women voters and voters of color to the polls. Since our founding in 1985, we have helped elect the country's first woman as vice president, 157 women to the House, 26 to the Senate, 16 governors, and more than 1,300 women to state and local office. More than 40 percent of the candidates EMILYs List has helped elect to Congress have been women of color. After the 2016 election, more than 60,000 women reached out to EMILY's List about running for office laying the groundwork for the next decade of candidates for local, state, and national offices. In our effort to elect more women in offices across the country, we have created our Run to Win program, expanded our training program, including a Training Center online, and trained thousands of women.