I am on the steering committee of Illinois for Bernie Sanders, a grassroots volunteer organization that has been recruiting and organizing volunteers statewide for the 2020 Bernie campaign. We held a convention last summer and recruited Bernie supporters across the state to run for delegate. We help volunteers across the state communicate and get plugged into volunteer opportunities.

I am a progressive political organizer from Aurora. In 2015, I joined Aurora for Bernie, a group of grassroots volunteers who laid the groundwork until the official Bernie campaign office opened in 2016. I collected signatures, created walklists, ran canvassing events, made calls, and trained volunteers for the Bernie Sanders campaign. Bernie won Aurora and the surrounding collar counties handily. I started up again in 2019 and will continue to volunteer for Bernie Sanders through the 2020 election.

I was one of only three people from Illinois selected to represent Bernie Sanders on the rules committee at the 2016 Democratic National Convention. My colleagues and I authored and presented several proposals to improve the Democratic primary process. The end result of this meeting was that the DNC agreed to create the Unity Reform Commission, which was tasked with finalizing recommendations on party and primary reforms. Throughout this 2 year commission process, I coordinated with Bernie delegates in other states to ensure that reform advocates attended these meetings around the country, monitored their progress, kept people informed, and shared livestreams from meetings I could not attend. I recruited people to attend the Chicago meetings to talk to committee members and wrote detailed explanations of the reforms to assist them with this task. The final reforms included preventing superdelegates from voting on the first ballot, making the DNC more transparent, encouraging primaries while requiring caucuses to be more accessible and transparent, requiring states to make it easier to register for party primaries, and combating voter suppression. I think this year the Democratic National Convention rules committee will be very important, and I hope to be elected as delegate to make sure I am there to help. We need to make sure the reforms that we passed continue to stay in place while working for continual improvement. After the fiasco in Iowa this year, we may be dealing with reevaluating the caucus process and the primary calendar as well. I have been serving as a resource to others to explain primary and delegate rules, so I am well positioned to help make sure rules are being followed and help other delegates plan for convention, especially if a brokered convention seems likely.

I am also a founding board member of Progressives of Kane County, which was formed by 2016 Bernie volunteers in order to get local progressive candidates elected. I helped write their platform and bylaws and organized coordinated canvassing events for endorsed candidates. I recruited and trained dozens of precinct committeemen and advised candidates running for office.

I am the Chair of the Naperville Township Democrats and also the Democratic Precinct Committeeperson for Naperville Township Precinct 63. In 2017, the Naperville Township Democrats came together as a team to flip Naperville Township government from red to blue and we have been continuing to flip local Republican seats since then. I also served on the DuPage County Democrats Bylaws Committee, where we recently wrote and passed a package of county bylaw reforms. Besides being a leader in the local party, I have volunteered for various political campaigns, including local, state, and federal races.