Hilary B. Rosen | |
|---|---|
 Hilary Rosen in January 2016 | |
| Born | 1958 (age 67–68) West Orange, New Jersey, U.S. |
| Alma mater | George Washington University |
| Occupations | Communications and political strategist |
| Employer | SKDKnickerbocker |
| Known for |
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| Political party | Democratic |
Hilary Rosen (born 1958) is the former head of theRecording Industry Association of America (RIAA). She was a columnist forThe Washington Post and the first Washingtoneditor-at-large and political director ofThe Huffington Post. She has also provided political commentary forCNN,CNBC, andMSNBC.
She worked for the RIAA for 16 years, including asCEO from 1998 to 2003. From 2010 to 2023 she was a partner and managing director at thepublic relations firm SKDKnickerbocker. She has been a registeredlobbyist during her career, both at the RIAA and for theHuman Rights Campaign (HRC). Rosen has been an advocate forLGBT rights since the early 1980s. She is now an independent communications consultant, board advisor and a television commentator on US and British TV.
Rosen was born inWest Orange, New Jersey in 1958 to aJewish family.[1] Her father worked as aninsurance agent and her mother was the city's first councilwoman.[2][3] In high school, Rosen served as student council president.[2] She earned herbachelor's degree in international business fromGeorge Washington University in 1981.[4] Her parents divorced while Rosen was at college.[3]
In 1979, Rosen began working as a legislative assistant in the Washington, D.C. office of GovernorBrendan Byrne (D-NJ),[5] who was a friend of Rosen's mother.[3][6] She also worked for SenatorBill Bradley (D-NJ) early in her career.[7] Rosen worked for the lobbying firm Liz Robbins Associates in the 1980s.[8]
In 1987, Rosen joined theRecording Industry Association of America (RIAA), the trade organization representing the Americanrecording industry, as its first government relations director.[6][8] In 1989, she and her colleague Jay Berman updated theParental Advisory label and launched its public awareness campaign.[8] In 1992, she took a brief leave from the RIAA to serve as SenatorDianne Feinstein's transition director and set up theCalifornia Democratic Party's office inWashington, D.C.[7][9]
As a registered lobbyist from 1999 to 2003,[10] Rosen influenced the decisions made by Congress on behalf of nearly 350 companies and thousands of artists represented by the RIAA.[8] In 1995, Rosen supported artists' rights whenBob Dole, thenSenate Majority Leader, criticizedTime Warner and said that rap lyrics promoted violence and were degrading to women.[11][12] She became the organization's president andchief operating officer in May 1996.[8] Rosen was a strong supporter of theDigital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which became law in 1998, to prohibit the creation of technologies used to get around copyright protections.[13][14] Rosen was promoted to the role ofchief executive officer in 1998.[2] In 1999, theRIAA Diamond certification was awarded for the first time, recognizing albums that have shipped more than 10 million copies.[15] Rosen said the award, which was named as such because "diamonds are valuable [and] no two are alike", represented "a quantum leap" for the music industry and an expansion of the national music market.[15]
In 2000, the American musical recording companyA&M Records along with several others, through the RIAA,sued Napster on grounds of copyright infringement under the DMCA,[16] which led to the shutting down of the pioneeringpeer-to-peer file sharing service. As the face of the RIAA, Rosen was vilified by proponents of free file sharing,[3][17] and even traveled with security at one point because she was receiving death threats.[2][4][6] Nonetheless, Rosen encouraged partnerships between the recording industry and online music businesses,[18] and consulted on the launch of digital music services such asApple Inc.'siTunes Store.[19] Rosen was recognized for advancing the industry's political efforts and appeared on lists of influential leaders, includingEntertainment Weekly's "Annual Power List" andNational Journal's "Washington's Powerful Insiders".[7] She was included inThe Hollywood Reporter's list of the most powerful women in entertainment in 1998,[20] 2000 (number 10),[21][22] 2002 (number 17),[23] and 2003 (number 10).[24]
Rosen resigned from the RIAA in June 2003 to spend more time with her family.[4] Following her resignation, she reportedly "questioned the value of lawsuits against individual downloaders" said she had attempted to "push the industry to evolve".[6] In 2007, she said, "I won't be aGeorge Tenet here, but it's pretty well known that I was impatient with the pace of the industry's embrace of online distribution of music. There's no substitute for speed when times are dire. The record companies had valid reasons for their caution, but that caution let the situation get out of hand."[6]
Rosen is a Democratic strategist and political pundit.[6][7][25] She was a regular political columnist forThe Washington Post, has authored articles for many national publications, and provided political commentary forCNBC andMSNBC.[4][7] In 2008, she became aCNN contributor, appearing on regular programming as well as special political coverage.[7] Also, in 2008, Rosen became the first Washingtoneditor-at-large and political director ofThe Huffington Post.[4][7] In 2010, she andThe Huffington Post, which was editorially critical ofBP following theDeepwater Horizon oil spill,[6] reached a mutual decision to part ways when Rosen's firm,Brunswick Group, began consulting for the British oil and gas company.[4][17][26] In April 2012, Rosen was criticized for saying thatAnn Romney had "never worked a day in her life" when discussingMitt Romney's reliance on his wife as an adviser on women's issues during a CNN appearance. Rosen apologized the next day.[27][28] In 2013, Rosen began writing forThe Washington Post as an opinion contributor.
In 2006, Rosen and Jay Berman, who formerly worked at RIAA, briefly ran the firm Berman Rosen Global Strategies, consulting for tech companies such asFacebook,Viacom, andXM.[6] In 2008, she joined the public relations firmBrunswick Group to head its Washington, D.C. office.[6][29][30] In 2010, Rosen became a partner and managing director at the political communications and public relations firmSKDKnickerbocker, leading the company alongside Anita Dunn.[4][31][32] The firm is known for its work on progressive issues and focuses on Democrats in its political work.[33] The firm also is employed byTransCanada Corporation to improve their public relations.[34] As a communications consultant, Rosen attended theWhite House on multiple occasions duringBarack Obama'spresidency. At least five meetings were with the president to discuss messaging around hishealth care reform plans. Rosen worked for clients Starbucks, Microsoft, American Airlines, Planned Parenthood, AT&T, at SKDK and led numerous national public affairs campaigns.[6][17] Following her 2012 comments regarding Ann Romney, Rosen was the subject of critical coverage by some media outlets, which notedWhite House visitor logs and speculated whether Rosen or SKDKnickerbocker employees were operating as "unofficial" or "unregistered" lobbyists.[35][36][37] Rosen has advised many national candidates, and in 2012The Wall Street Journal reported that she was consulting withDebbie Wasserman Schultz during her time as chair of theDemocratic National Committee.[6][7][38] SKDKnickerbocker was selected byEdie Windsor's legal team to lead the public relations efforts behind the challenge to theDefense of Marriage Act (United States v. Windsor, 2013).[39] In 2014, Rosen and Dunn served as senior advisors to the LGBTQ rights group Americans for Marriage Equality.[40]Planned Parenthood hired Rosen to help manage the2015 undercover videos controversy.[41] Rosen and SKDKnickerbocker were assistingSusan G. Komen for the Cure with a public relations campaign for an environmental research initiative when the Planned Parenthood controversy arose.[32] Rosen and Dunn sold SKDK to Stagwell in October 2015 and Rosen stayed on to manage the firm while Dunn went to work for the Biden Campaign and into the Biden White House. Rosen left SKDK in 2023.
During the campaigning leading up to the2012 United States presidential election, Rosen criticized Ann Romney, wife of then-presidential candidateMitt Romney, claiming that, as astay-at-home mother, Romney "never worked a day in her life." Rosen was pressured to apologize when her remarks were condemned by theDemocratic National Committee and PresidentObama, who stated he had "little patience for commentary about the spouses of political candidates."Michelle Obama also distanced herself from Rosen, expressing onTwitter that "every mother works hard, and every woman deserves to be respected."[42]
Rosen was criticized in December 2017 for making two tweets calling severalGeorgetown Hoyas fans "anti-Semitic," singling one out as a "bigot" after she noticed a photograph of a fan wearing a bacon costume. After Rosen was told that the fan in question was known as "bacon man" and wore the costume because of his last name (Bakan, pronounced "bacon"), she apologized.[43][44][45]
In January 2018,[46] Rosen admitted she bought more than 500,000 fake Twitter followers[47] as "an experiment," to see whether to recommend the practice to her PR clients.[48]
Rosen became an LGBTQ activist starting in 1982 when she and others demanded federal intervention to combatHIV/AIDS in the United States.[7] She outed herself to members of Congress in an attempt to winHIV/AIDS funding.[39]
In 2004, she managed the successful campaign to defeatGeorge W. Bush's proposed amendment to theU.S. Constitution banningsame-sex marriage.[7] Her work on this campaign is profiled in John Harwood and Gerald Seib's bookPennsylvania Avenue: Profiles in Backroom Power (2008).[7]
Between 2004 and 2008, Rosen was a registered lobbyist for theHuman Rights Campaign, the largestLGBT civil rightsadvocacy group and political lobbying organization in the United States. In 2008, she served as interim director for the organization.[4][6] She also served on the Human Rights Campaign Foundation board.[8]The Advocate included Rosen in their "People of the Year" list in 2008.[49]
Rosen consulted on theHollingsworth v. Perry (originallyPerry v. Schwarzenegger) series of federal court cases that legalizedsame-sex marriage in California.[50] Rosen was included inThe Advocate's "Out100" list for her work on the "Respect for Marriage Coalition" media campaign during theDefense of Marriage Act challenge andUnited States v. Windsor civil rights case.[39] She was also named one of the 25 "most powerful LGBT players" in Washington, D.C., byNational Journal and ranked number 62 inOut's 2012 "Power List".[7][51]National Journal included Rosen in their list of the "30 Most Influential Out Washingtonians" in 2014.[52]
Inspired byShowtime's LGBTQ television seriesThe L Word, Rosen collaborated with the show's creator to establish OurChart.com, asocial networking site for lesbians. Its name refers to "the chart", which was used on the show to illustrate the relationships between characters.[4] The site was defunct by 2012, having been acquired by Showtime.[6]
In 1992, she helped foundRock the Vote, a non-profit organization that encourages voter turnout among young voters.[2][7]
Rosen and Tammy Haddad co-host the annual Garden Brunch prior to theWhite House Correspondents' Association's dinner.[4][53]
Rosen metElizabeth Birch in 1994. Birch was a lawyer forApple and later became the executive director of theHuman Rights Campaign.[2] The couple adopted twins from Texas in 1999.[14][54] They received some criticism from conservative groups who opposedLGBT adoption.[2] The two separated in 2006.[4][6] Rosen married her partner Megan Murphy in November 2024.
Rosen has lived inWashington, D.C. since her studies atGeorge Washington University.[4] She is well-connected and has been called a "Washington insider".[4][6]Al Gore andGreta van Susteren andAnderson Cooper were among guests who attended her fiftieth birthday celebration.[6]
In addition to being a Democratic strategist, Rosen has described herself as a "strong, progressive Democrat".[2][39] She has been a longtime supporter of the Democratic Party and has hosted fundraisers for candidates, including SenatorBarbara Boxer (D-CA).[8] She has also been a longtime supporter ofHillary Clinton[55][56] and supported President Joe Biden in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary race. Her stout advocacy for Biden led her to misquote and lecture former Ohio state senator Nina Turner about the meaning of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s warning as to White moderates. She later apologized for her misstep.[57] She has made many personal financial contributions to politicians and groups such as theLPACGay & Lesbian Victory Fund and Kennedy for Senate 2000.[8]
{{cite web}}:Missing or empty|url= (help) Note: User must query the Lobbying Disclosure Act Database using "Rosen, Hilary" as the registered "Lobbyist Name".We had already had a number of intense meetings with thePerry team and its allies, including ... Hilary Rosen, who had been brought in as a communications consultant for both cases.
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