1. Christopher Stephen Lehane was born on June 2,1967 and is an American political consultant and cryptocurrency executive who has served as a lawyer, spokesperson and expert in opposition research for the Clinton White House, Democratic candidates for public office and various business, Labor, entertainment and professional sports organizations.
In 2012, Lehane co-authored a book on damage control titled Masters of Disaster published by Palgrave, MacMillan's academic imprint.
Chris Lehane wrote and produced the film Knife Fight, a political satire acquired by IFC and released in January 2013.
From 2015 until 2022, Chris Lehane served as the Head of Global Policy and Public Affairs for home-sharing startup Airbnb.
Chris Lehane joined Haun Ventures, a crypto investment firm, in 2022, and is known for his strong support of blockchain technology, and his proposal for a new deal for Web3.
In 1992, Chris Lehane was the political director of the Clinton-Gore presidential campaign in Maine, and was later brought into the White House where he served as a lawyer in the White House Counsel's Office who worked as part of a small unit responsible for helping the White House manage various scandals throughout the 1990s such as Whitewater and the Monica Lewinsky affair.
In 1995, Chris Lehane authored a 332-page memo on a media "conspiracy" against the Clintons, of which only 2 and a half pages are written text; the remainder being newspaper and internet clippings.
Chris Lehane was credited with improving Gore's press relations with the press corps, his one liners and for his opposition research work.
Chris Lehane has done work for other leading political figures in the US, including New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo and former California Governor Gray Davis.
In 2007, Chris Lehane helped create the Lincoln Brigade, an organization that defeated a Republican sponsored ballot initiative designed to change how California divides up its Electoral College votes.
Chris Lehane has served as a strategist on various statewide ballot campaigns, including running the "no" side to a Republican Party sponsored Electoral College initiative; Labor's Proposition 17; and the effort to pass California Proposition 19, or the Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010 and other statewide and local initiatives.
In 2010, Chris Lehane helped launch Level The Playing Field an independent expenditure organization backed by organized Labor designed to target Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman.
Also in 2010, Chris Lehane was a lead strategist on No On 23, the successful effort to beat back the oil industry's effort to overturn California's precedent using climate change laws.
Chris Lehane was active in the June 2012 campaign to raise the tobacco tax in California and is the lead strategist for Proposition 39, the Clean Energy Jobs initiative, which seeks to close an existing loop-hole in the California state tax code that provides a more favorable tax treatment for out of state companies who do business in California compared to in state companies.
Chris Lehane serves on the board of advisors for various high tech companies, non-profit boards, including as member of the Board of Trustees of Amherst College.
Chris Lehane is often included in discussions of bare-knuckled methodologies employed by political campaign consultants, including feeding information to selected media outlets.
Chris Lehane is often quoted as an expert on crisis management.
Chris Lehane's firm has represented California Edison during the California Energy crisis, Goldman Sachs during the financial crisis, Cisco Systems when the Internet bubble burst, Lance Armstrong on various matters, Al Gore's Current TV when it fired Keith Olbermann; Madonna in relation to the Kabbalah Center and her charity in Africa; Rob Reiner and First Five; Hollywood studios, Indian tribes, and other leading businesses.
Chris Lehane has worked for consumer groups, trial lawyers and helped lead organized Labor's opposition to California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's agenda in California.
Chris Lehane is co-author, along with his business partner Mark Fabiani and Stanford Business School Professor Bill Guttentag, of Masters of Disaster: The Ten Commandments of Damage Control.
Chris Lehane is a writer and producer of Knife Fight, a political satire acquired by IFC that consider whether the ends justify the means and stars Rob Lowe as a political fixer dealing with a series of scandals.