Tara McGowan was the co-founder and CEO of multiple organizations which have been noted for large expenditures on digital advertising in preparation for the 2020 United States presidential election, including the political organization Acronym, the company Lockwood Strategy, and the media company Courier Newsroom.
10 Facts About Tara McGowan
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Tara McGowan was the director of the advertising branch of Priorities USA Action, which was the primary super PAC supporting Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign, and was a digital producer for the re-election campaign of Barack Obama.
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In 2016, Tara McGowan directed the $42 million digital advertising branch of Priorities USA Action, the primary super PAC supporting Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign.
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In 2017, Tara McGowan launched the political strategy firm Lockwood Strategy, which Campaigns and Elections identified as a crucial force in Democratic Party victories in the 2017 Virginia elections.
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Shortly after founding Lockwood Strategy, Tara McGowan co-founded the digital advertising organisation Acronym together with Michael Dubin and with Laurene Powell Jobs and Reid Hoffman's financial backing.
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One of Tara McGowan's projects, called Courier Newsroom, is a for-profit media company that produces digital newspapers in Arizona, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Wisconsin, with the aim of filling news deserts in swing states by providing regional news coverage from a left-wing perspective.
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Tara McGowan has been credited with significant innovations in digital political strategy, and has often been described as one of the few progressive strategists to focus specifically on digital media.
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Joshua Green, writing for Bloomberg News, wrote that Tara McGowan has "gained notoriety for her outspoken criticism of her party's inability to challenge, or even clearly comprehend, Trump's dominance of the digital landscape".
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Tara McGowan has received awards for her work on digital campaigns: she was recognized as a 2018 Rising Star by Campaigns and Elections magazine, and was listed as a "Name to know" by Politico.
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In 2015, Tara McGowan married Michael Halle, a political consultant who has worked as a lead organizer in Iowa for Hillary Clinton and as a senior strategist for Pete Buttigieg.