Heather Charisse McGhee (born June 6, 1980) is a New York Times bestselling author and policy advocate. She is a former president and currently a trustee emeritus ofDemos, a non-profit progressive U.S. think tank.^[2] McGhee is a regular contributor toNBC News and frequently appears as a guest and panelist onMeet the Press,All In with Chris Hayes, andReal Time with Bill Maher.^[3][4][5][6]

Heather McGhee
Born	Heather Charisse McGhee (1980-06-06)June 6, 1980 (age 44) Chicago, IL
Education	Yale University (BA) University of California, Berkeley (JD)
Spouse	Cassim Shepard[1]

Heather Charisse McGhee grew up in theSouth Side, Chicago and is the daughter of Gail C. Christopher and Earl J. McGhee.^[5] In seventh grade, McGhee enrolled in The Bement School as a boarding student.^[7] graduated fromMilton Academy in 1997.^[8] McGhee received a B.A. in American Studies fromYale University in 2001.^[5] She was initially drawn to theater and creative writing but eventually became interested in economic policy.^[5]

McGhee attended theUC Berkeley School of Law, citing how law school could help give her the credentials to change public policy. She graduated with aJ.D. in 2009.^[3][5][9]

After graduating from Yale in 2001, she taught English inBarcelona for a short time, but soon after theSeptember 11 attacks she moved toHollywood to pursue a career in television writing.^[10]

After about a year, she moved toNew York City and began working with the non-profit think tank,Demos.^[5] In 2003, McGhee first connected withElizabeth Warren and her daughter,Amelia Warren Tyagi, on the topic of credit card debt.^[5]

She left Demos to attend law school and serve as a Deputy Policy Director for theJohn Edwards 2008 presidential campaign.

McGhee returned toDemos in 2009 and co-chaired a task force withAmericans for Financial Reform which helped develop theDodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act in 2009.^[11] McGhee became the president of Demos in 2014.^[5][9][12] In early 2018, she stepped down as president but remained a distinguished senior fellow atDemos.^[13]

In December 2019 McGhee became chair of the board of directors ofColor of Change.^[14]

In 2016, McGhee's televised phone conversation with a man named Gary onC-SPAN who admitted racial prejudice ("I'm a White male, and I am prejudiced. The reason it is something I wasn't taught but it's kind of something that I learned.") was widely covered by news media organizations and viewed over a million times.^{[15][16][17][18]} A year later, Gary stated he had taken her advice to heart and his views had changed.^[19][20]

In 2019, McGhee presented aTED talk entitled "Racism has a cost for everyone."^[21]

In 2021, McGhee was interviewed byChristiane Amanpour onCNN, titled "Why racism hurts everyone, regardless of race."^[22]

McGhee has appeared on episodes ofPod Save America and was a guest host for a live recording of the podcast inBoston.^[23][24]

In September 2022, McGhee gave a brief interview with NPR'sAri Shapiro to discuss the student debt crisis.^[25]

In March 2021, her book "The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together" debuted at #3 on theNew York Times best seller list (for non-fiction). In it she discusses what she calls "drained-pool politics", symbolized by the wilful shutting down of publicswimming pools in response todesegregation.^[26][27]

In July 2022, McGhee debuted"The Sum of Us Podcast", which expands on her book by the same title.^[28]

• Appearances onC-SPAN
• Everyday Solidarity: Interracial Organizing Stories fromThe Sum of Us (w/ Heather McGhee), part of the Teach the Black Freedom Struggle online series.