The RootsAction Team

Campaign Coordinator: DAVID SWANSON's books include War Is A Lie. He blogs at http://davidswanson.org and http://warisacrime.org and hosts Talk Nation Radio. Swanson helped plan the nonviolent occupation of Freedom Plaza in Washington DC in 2011.  Swanson holds a master's degree in philosophy from the University of Virginia. He has worked as a newspaper reporter and as a communications director, with jobs including press secretary for Dennis Kucinich's 2004 presidential campaign, media coordinator for the International Labor Communications Association, and three years as communications coordinator for ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now.

Board Chair: PIA GALLEGOS is a New Mexico-based social activist and has been a trial lawyer for about three decades.  She fights for workers who are discriminated against in promotions and terminations or who are sexually harassed in the workplace.  She has also assisted and advised many progressive nonprofits.

Board member: DEBORAH THOMAS is the publisher of Extra!, the magazine of the media watch group FAIR. Over the years, she has been a publishing consultant and book designer – and has worked at various magazines, including Grand Street, Seven Days and The Nation.

Senior Fellow / Co-Founder: NORMAN SOLOMON founded the Institute for Public Accuracy in 1997 and was its executive director from then until 2010; he is now IPA’s president. Immersed in anti-war, social justice and environmental movements since the late 1960s, he is the author of a dozen books including War Made Easy and Made Love, Got War. He has written op-ed pieces for almost every large daily U.S. newspaper and appears often on a wide range of radio and TV outlets.

Board member / Co-Founder: JEFF COHEN is a media critic, writer and journalism professor who founded the media watch group FAIR in 1986. For years, he was a regular pundit on CNN, Fox News and MSNBC discussing issues of media and politics; his latest book is Cable News Confidential: My Misadventures in Corporate Media.