# Michael Whitney (@michaelwhitney.bsky.social)

Profile: https://sifa.id/p/michaelwhitney.bsky.social
Headline: Campaigner and grassroots fundraiser for global organizations
Location: Greater Madrid Metropolitan Area

## About

I am a senior leader in global nonprofit organizations with deep experience in campaigning and digital fundraising. I've helped NGOs and political parties and candidates mobilize millions of people to become grassroots activists, supporters, and donors for their causes, raising more than $500 million USD.

## Career

- **Senior Director of Development at Mozilla** (Feb 2025 - Jun 2026)
  Philadelphia, PA
  Lead a cross-team revamp of Mozilla Foundation's email strategy, convening stakeholders from across the organization to implement a data-informed process that addressed production, content creation, success metrics, and underlying infrastructure projects to help the email program.
  
  Co-created a new, impact-focused advocacy campaigns strategy to fit within the organization's updated strategy that led to Meta product changes to protect users' privacy.
- **Interim VP of Development at Mozilla** (Feb 2025 - Nov 2025)
  I led the consolidation of a 12-person Development team from previously siloed functions following an organizational restructure, establishing shared processes, business rules, and a unified fundraising operation.
  
  During this period, grassroots fundraising reached $7.2m USD, a 48% year-over-year increase, building on a growing base of small-dollar supporters. Institutional giving grew from $2m USD to $11.8m USD through new program infrastructure.
  
  Initiated and supported the search for a permanent VP before transitioning out of the role.
- **Director, Digital Engagement at Mozilla** (May 2023 - Feb 2025)
  Philadelphia, PA
  I led the rebuilding of a grassroots campaigning and fundraising program for Mozilla Foundation, bringing annual donations from $2.2m USD to $4.8m USD in just 18 months and doubling the number of engaged supporters.
  
  While leading a remote team of 9 people located in 4 countries, we established data and reporting processes, standardized localization in 6 languages for our global list of supporters, and brought the overall program to maturity for an organization of its size.
- **Email Campaigning and Fundraising Trainer at Self-Employed** (Dec 2016 - May 2023)
  \- I consult for NGOs and political campaigns on email campaigning and digital fundraising, including writing, planning, producing, and advising on all aspects of campaigning.
  \- I lead trainings about email and fundraising for staff of non-profit organizations. My classes are largely structured as multi-week courses and in-depth fellowships, with content designed to train staff of all skill levels about email content and strategy, newsletter list growth and acquisition, and testing and experimentation.
  \- Clients include 350.org, ACLU, Amnesty International USA, Coworker.org, SumOfUs, Working Families Party, and groups in Australia, New Zealand, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the U.K.
- **Digital Fundraising Manager at Bernie Sanders for President** (Apr 2019 - Apr 2020)
  Philadelphia, PA
  \- Raised more than $200 million USD from 10 million contributions made by 3 million donors in support of U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign.
  \- Served as one of three writers responsible for email content, which was the campaign’s single largest driver of money and supporter engagement.
  \- Also responsible for email deliverability, testing and experimentation in emails and on the website, and hiring staff for the fundraising department.
- **Newsletter Editor and Email Strategist at The Intercept** (Feb 2018 - Apr 2019)
  \- Led the expansion of the independent news outlet’s newsletter and email fundraising programs, doubling the size of the newsletter subscriber list and significantly expanding its paying membership base.
  \- Worked with product managers, designers, and developers to integrate newsletter subscriptions and membership signup modules throughout the website, and to redesign newsletters themselves to maximize readership and engagement.
- **Fundraising Expert-in-Residence at Centre for Australian Progress** (Feb 2017 - Sep 2017)
  Melbourne, Victoria, AU
  \- Led two in-depth, months-long fellowships on digital fundraising for 40+ fundraisers and organizers at NGOs, political parties, and news organizations in Oceania.
  \- Consulted for six NGOs in Australia on projects about digital fundraising and supporter engagement.
- **Senior Campaign Strategist at Revolution Messaging** (Jul 2014 - Dec 2016)
  Worked as a digital mobilization and small-dollar fundraising consultant for progressive candidates and organizations, including Gabby Giffords, Zephyr Teachout, and DeRay Mckesson.
- **Digital Fundraising Manager at Bernie 2016** (Apr 2015 - Jul 2016)
  Washington
  I managed the digital fundraising program for Senator Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign, raising more than $218 million online from an unprecedented 8.5 million individual contributions and 2.7 million donors.
  
  This program was hailed by the New York Times as "a new reality for digital campaigning," and is largely recognized as one of the most successful and efficient online fundraising operations ever, at times surpassing President Barack Obama's historic efforts. My work included content development, list management, lead acquisition, candidate endorsements, ally coordination, and more.
- **Digital Organizing Consultant at Self-Employed** (Feb 2014 - Jun 2014)
  Brooklyn
  I worked as an independent consultant for progressive organizations, including:  ♦ MoveOn.org: Created a pilot program for member-to-member fundraising, building on the success of the group’s distributed petition platform to encourage members to raise money for their own campaigns. ♦ Everytown: Worked with the gun violence prevention group to build national email program; developed strategies for distributed campaign plans to connect local organizing groups with national digital capacity.
- **Director of U.S. Email at Change.org** (May 2012 - Feb 2014)
  I directed email campaigning for Change.org’s 20 million U.S. users, and helped manage the brand and editorial direction of the content received by the company’s 55 million users worldwide. In this role I managed a team to create content on a fast-moving production calendar that sent more than 400 million action alerts to U.S. users in 2013 and accounted for 60% of the company’s realized revenue, growing the email list more than three times in size.
  
  I coordinated email work with international campaign teams, business development, product & engineering, and executives to meet company goals and to collaborate on new company initiatives and strategies.
- **Campaign Director at Change.org** (Jul 2011 - May 2012)
  I led email campaigns for Change.org petitions, working with issue experts and organizers in the U.S. and Australia to develop strategy, messaging, and targeting for campaigns on the Change.org platform. The latter part of my work in this position included serving as the organizing team lead for the successful petition started by Sybrina Fulton, the mother of Trayvon Martin, to prosecute her son’s killer.
- **Digital Strategy Director at Firedoglake.com** (Aug 2009 - Jul 2011)
  Brooklyn
  Managed a team to organize advocacy campaigns, send emails and newsletters, build web products, and improve tech infrastructure for multiple web properties with two million monthly visitors for this progressive political blog.
- **Online Campaign Manager at Service Employees International Union** (Sep 2008 - Aug 2009)
  Washington
  I managed online activities for the Employee Free Choice Act campaign and financial reform issues, including direction of email, blogs, online advertising, and online press communications across a labor coalition. Responsibilities also included managing a team of five online organizers to support the union’s advocacy efforts.
- **New Media Coordinator at American Rights at Work** (May 2006 - Sep 2008)
  Washington
  Worked on online operations for this labor rights group, including supporter advocacy, blogger relations, and website management and development.
- **Strategist at CollegeLabs.org** (Jul 2004 - Nov 2004)
  Washington
  CollegeLabs.org was a project of Music for America to organize student voters in the the 2004 election. I advised campus organizers and project coordinators on online organizing and student media outreach.
- **Generation Dean Co-Founder at Dean for America** (Mar 2003 - Feb 2004)
  Burlington
  I created Students for Dean, a nation-wide organization of students supporting Howard Dean for President, organizing our online and offline communications and managing a team of bloggers and campaigners. When the race ended in March 2004, we had more than 23,000 students and 1,200 groups to support Howard Dean for President -- at that time, the biggest youth organizing effort by a presidential campaign.

## Publications

- How Beto O'Rourke Raised a Stunning $38 Million in Just Three Months — The Intercept (Oct 2018) https://theintercept.com/2018/10/16/beto-o-rourke-campaign-donations/
- The Democratic Party’s Looming Fundraising Crisis — Politico Magazine (Aug 2017) http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/08/10/the-democratic-partys-looming-fundraising-crisis-215474
- I Miss My Dog’s Farts — SBS Australia (Jul 2017) https://www.sbs.com.au/news/the-feed/i-miss-my-dog-s-farts
- Why Are Political Groups Pretending to Be Debt Collectors? — The Nation (Apr 2015) https://www.thenation.com/article/why-are-political-groups-pretending-be-debt-collectors/
- Songs from a Johnny Cash Album Where the Law is Just and Your Loved Ones Can Be Trusted — The Toast (Mar 2015) https://the-toast.net/2015/03/17/songs-johnny-cash-album-law-just/

## Skills

### Business
- Digital Marketing
### Interpersonal
- Communication
### Other
- Adobe Photoshop
- Advocacy Campaigns
- Artificial Intelligence (AI)
- Blogging
- Campaigns
- Change Management
- Channel Strategy
- Coalitions
- Data Privacy
- Digital Engagement
- Digital Media
- Digital Strategy
- Donor Engagement
- Editing
- Email Campaigning
- Email Marketing
- Email Production
- Email Strategy
- Fundraising
- General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)
- Grassroots Campaigning
- Grassroots Development
- Grassroots Fundraising
- New Media
- Non-profit Management
- Non-profits
- Nonprofit Leadership
- Nonprofits
- Online Advertising
- Online Campaign Management
- Online Communications
- Online Marketing
- Political Campaigns
- Political Communication
- Political Consulting
- Politics
- Team Management
- Team Restructuring
- Technology Policy
- Training
- Web Analytics
- Web Content
- Writing

## Education

- **American University** — Bachelor's Degree (2002 - 2006)

## Awards

- 16 Young Americans Shaping the 2016 Presidential Election (May 2016)

## Languages

- English (native)

## Links

- linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwhitney