If you haven’t met me yet, here are a few things you should know: I’ve spent the past 20 years building progressive power and winning fights for racial justice. I’ve organized campaigns, built coalitions, raised millions of dollars, and led organizations. From 2011 to 2024, I was President of Color Of Change, and grew it into the largest online racial justice organization in the country. We took on everyone from Big Tech, Hollywood, prosecutors and corporations, and we won. Before that, I was a senior leader at GLAAD, where we seeded new narratives, changed policies, and moved hearts and minds.
I've been around long enough to see movements grow and shrink, fracture and rebuild. But through it all I’ve seen - and been part of - a lot of wins. (hence the name of the newsletter)
What I’ve learned is that winning is about power. And real power isn’t just symbolic. Real power is about more than inclusion or visibility. Power exists when institutions have to respond to our communities to meet demands that change real peoples lives — and Black, Brown, and working people are better because of it.
This is a challenging moment. Our opposition is trying to demolish everything we’ve built. The forces we’re up against—attacks on equity, efforts to dismantle democracy, corporate retreat from hard-won commitments—are coordinated, well-funded, and unrelenting.
But I believe that winning is still possible
This newsletter is about how we win — not just in theory, but in practice. The hard, messy, strategic, often unseen work it takes to make progress permanent. It’s a place for me to provide my perspective on what’s happening across the country, and give some insight into some of lessons I’ve learned, the fights we’re in, and what it takes to build movements that don’t just make noise, but make change.
I’ll share thoughts, analysis, ideas - and maybe some random musings or recommendations along the way?
"Let’s get to it."
Part 2
A quick update on my trip to New Orleans earlier this month for Essence Fest. Any of you that have gone know that it’s always a great event, and New Orleans is one of my favorite cities.
I was honored to join Nikole Hannah-Jones and Charles Blow on the main stage in a conversation about civil rights, backlash, and how we fight to win—not just to endure.
You can read more about our conversation here.
It was an affirming and galvanizing discussion that also highlighted what I mentioned earlier – the fear and apprehension that so many people feel right now. They are afraid of losing ground, or being targeted and of watching hard won wins unravel before their eyes. From the stage, I spoke to how we will harness that energy and fight back against the cataclysmic onslaught we’re seeing from the other side.
What really landed, and what people kept talking to me about afterward, was the need for integrated strategies, which I described as “a strategy of forcing institutions to be accountable while working to also build our own.” In other words, we can't just rely on changing the Facebooks of the world. We also need our own institutions. Ones that embody what we care about.
"As I said America can love, celebrate, and monetize Black culture — and still hate Black people. And if we don’t understand that contradiction, we risk fighting symbolic battles while losing the structural ones that actually determine whether our communities thrive or suffer."
We also hosted a private strategy session focused on building the campaigns, infrastructure, and alignment required to turn cultural reach into real-world power. Over 100 journalists, artists, organizers, and strategists joined us. We were grounded by Alphonso David of the Global Black Economic Forum and heard from dynamic leaders like Angela Rye, April Verrett (SEIU), and Kendrick Sampson (Build Power).
Overall it was a great few days. "I’ve spent much of my life thinking about what it means to lead as a Black person in spaces that weren’t built for us." This event was an opportunity to be in deep dialogue with other black leaders who understand what this role requires.
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