National Campaign Organizer Visits Manship

I'm sharing this email from Prof. Bob Mann:

You and your students are welcome to drop in tomorrow to hear from Daren Berringer, formerly national field director for the 2008 John Edwards campaign and who worked with Joe Trippi's firm during the 2004 Howard Dean campaign. His bio is below. He'll be in Hodges 216 at 11 a.m. on Monday, Nov. 16.

Daren Berringer

Daren has worked in local, congressional, gubernatorial, senate and
presidential politics since 1995. Within those campaigns he has held the
positions of media consultant, campaign manager, political director, field
director and press secretary.

Some of the more notable roles Daren has played in the political arena were
as the field and political director for the 2002 upset victory for Democratic
Congressman Tim Holden who, as the result of redistricting, faced a 20-year
incumbent congressman in which the Republican had a 60% to 40% voter
registration edge. The campaign was rated by Roll Call as one of the best
campaigns of 2002.

In 2003, Daren took on the position as state director of Michigan for the
Dean for America presidential campaign, during which he was profiled by the
Washington, D.C. based political online publication, The Hotline. Despite
having no financial resources spent on commercial advertising, Governor Dean
finished second and captured more delegates in Michigan to the 2004 Democratic
National Convention than any other state.

Following the Dean for America campaign, Daren became the political director
for the Democratic U.S. Senate campaign of Joe Hoeffel in Pennsylvania and was
named to the 2004 Dream Team by the political website, PoliticsPA.com.

After joining Joe Trippi & Associates at the end of 2004, Daren worked pro
bono in 2005 to assist in the building of the ONE Campaign and organizing
their famed worldwide Live 8 concert series. This included the finale event in
Edinburgh, Scotland as the run-up to the G8 Summit.

During the 2006 election cycle Daren served as the Senior Advisor and General
Consultant to Patrick Murphy (PA 8th) and John Hall (NY 19th) in their upset
victories over two highly-funded Republican incumbents. Both districts were
historical Republican strongholds. Earlier in that year, Daren produced his
first gubernatorial ad campaign that was rated as one of the Top 5 ads by The
Hotline's WebAttic for the primary election season.

In 2007 Daren joined John Edwards' presidential campaign to serve as his
National Field Director. While in that position, Daren implemented a
thirty-two state program that built a Community Leadership base of traditional
and non-traditional political activists—the first time any national campaign
had conducted this message-moving and organizing operation. He also created an
SMS (text messaging) organizing campaign that was featured in The New York
Times, The Wall Street Journal, and CNN. The innovative approach to voter
communication also resulted in John Edwards for President being the first
campaign in history to ever receive financial contributions via SMS, including
a $2,300 FEC maximum donation. Daren transitioned back into his media
consultant background as the campaign moved forward by creating concepts and
producing advertising that focused on New Hampshire television markets.

Daren has also appeared as a guest on Fox News and MSNBC's Hardball with
Chris Matthews and has on-the-record experience with Roll Call, Campaigns &
Elections, The New Republic, The New York Times, the Financial Times of
London, The Wall Street Journal, Philadelphia Inquirer, Detroit Free Press and
many other local news media outlets. In addition, Daren has been a guest
lecturer at The Washington Center, Louisiana State University and Indiana
University of Pennsylvania.