Steve Rabinowitz

Steve Rabinowitz, the only child of the late Dorothy and Harold Rabinowitz, grew up in Tucson, Arizona. He attended Tucson High School and the University of Arizona. He and his wife, Laurie Moskowitz, senior director for U.S. campaigns at the ONE Campaign,[8] live in Washington, D.C., with their two sons, Jake and Sammy.[9]

Rabinowitz's political campaign work began in 1975-76 when at age 18 he was national youth coordinator for Democrat Mo Udall's presidential campaign.[10] He subsequently worked on the national staffs of the presidential campaigns of Jerry Brown, John Anderson, Gary Hart, Walter Mondale, Paul Simon, Michael Dukakis, Bob Kerrey, and Bill Clinton. He headed Bill Clinton's 1992 campaign press advance team,[11] During that campaign cycle, he became widely known as "the rabbi," a play on his last name, hosting the Yom Kippur break fast at his rented home in Little Rock, Arkansas.[12][13] Hillary Clinton credits Rabinowitz with coming up with the term Hillaryland.[14]

During the 1992 Bill Clinton campaign and working with his colleague Jeff Eller, Rabinowitz helped remake the classic political town hall meeting, routinely placing Clinton in the center of a "bowl" of seated voters, surrounded and tiered on at least three sides, while Eller worked with local television stations for live regional and even national broadcast, and Clinton left the stool in the center of the audience and engaged individual, unscripted questioners, regardless of where they sat or the camera angle it produced. The format has been replicated countless times.[15]

In 1993, Rabinowitz was named Bill Clinton's White House director of media planning, responsible for the visual images of the president's public appearances.[16] He helped produce the peace treaty signings between Israel and the Palestinians on the White House South Lawn in September 1993, and between Israel and Jordan in the Arava in October 1994.[17] Rabinowitz produced an East Room presidential signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), witnessed by three of Clinton's predecessors – Presidents George H.W. Bush, Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford.

Steve Rabinowitz with Presidents (left to right) Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush, Gerald Ford and Bill Clinton (White House photo/Robert McNeely)

Also in 1993, Rabinowitz organized and led the first White House Passover seder for 50 Clinton White House and Administration staff. The traditional event was held in the Indian Treaty Room and catered kosher.[18]

QRS NewMedia, a company Rabinowitz co-founded with Laura Quinn and Mark Steitz, handled satellite feeds and radio actualities for the 1996 Clinton-Gore campaign. Using technology that Rabinowitz brought to national politics for Bill Clinton in 1992, QRS added census data and Nielsen research on each of the nation's television stations to produce breakdowns of viewing audiences, providing campaigns and political strategists with detailed information, including demographics, lifestyles and family income, on who watches what news program.[19] QRS also has created high-tech media presentations for political, government and corporate entities, and consulted nearly every subsequent Democratic Party presidential nominee and convention since.[13]

Rabinowitz helped organize a 2002 Israel rally in Washington, DC, on the West Front of the Capitol that drew an estimated crowd of 100,000[20] and the Israel@60 celebration on the National Mall in 2008.[17] The Israel@60 celebration featured a wide range of performers. Rabinowitz assisted with traditional advertising and guerilla marketing for the event, attracting 50,000-75,000 people.[21]

During Obama's 2012 reelection campaign, Rabinowitz helped create the Jewish Media Hub (The Hub), a political nonprofit directed at boosting the incumbent president's standing among American Jews. Employing mico-targeting and micro-websites, as well as other media, the group focused on differentiating Obama from Republican challenger Mitt Romney, highlighting differences on Israel, how to approach Iran's nuclear program, women's reproductive rights, gay marriage, and other social issues.[22]

In 2014, Rabinowitz, Marc Stanley and Fran Katz Watson launched Jewish Americans Ready for Hillary to support a 2016 presidential run for Hillary Clinton in the Jewish community.[23]

In 2016, Rabinowitz helped kick off and run Jews for Progress, a political action committee created to defend Hillary Clinton and persuade Jewish voters in swing states to support her.[24] Employing tactics much like those used in The Hub, the No Nukes for Iran Project, which Rabinowitz advised and that supported the Obama administration's nuclear agreement with Iran,[25] and Jews for Progress both used video, print, online and social media advertising and phones to target Jewish voters and influentials. In the case of Jews for Progress, polling showed a subsequent increase in the Jewish vote for Clinton over that for Barack Obama four years earlier, as all other Democratic Party base groups votes dropped.[26]

In addition to serving on the national staffs of nine presidential campaigns, Rabinowitz also was an informal adviser to the presidential campaigns of the Bill Clinton re-elect in 1996,[27] Al Gore in 2000,[28] John Kerry in 2004,[17] both Hillary Clinton campaigns (2008[29] and 2016[26]), and both Barack Obama campaigns (2008 and 2012[22]). He produced Al Gore's official announcement for president in his hometown of Carthage, Tennessee.[28] Among the many other campaigns on which he worked as a paid staffer were Jim Florio[30] and Peter Shapiro, both for governor of New Jersey, Carolyn Warner for governor of Arizona,[31] and Pat Leahy for re-election to the U.S. Senate from Vermont.[32] And, in 1980 Rabinowitz ran for office – unsuccessfully – seeking the school board in the Catalina Foothills School District in northern Tucson.[33]

In the 1980s and between political campaigns, Rabinowitz worked as a music promoter in Tucson, Arizona, producing concerts, music festivals and shows, an extended play (EP) Rock & Roll record and a Country Punk cassette tape, as well as radio shows, all featuring local bands.[34][35][36]

And, in 1984, Universal Pictures hired a number of recent Gary Hart campaign staff – including Rabinowitz – to manage the openings of its controversial film The Last Temptation of Christ around the country. They coordinated local media coverage and worked with various theater management and local police to contain the protests; when protests began to wane, they worked to generate larger, media-enticing demonstrations.[37] Rabinowitz also organized the Washington premier of director Spike Lee's 1989 movie Do The Right Thing.

Active at Adas Israel Congregation in Washington, D.C., Rabinowitz is assistant treasurer, having served for years as vice president for membership and external affairs. He also is active in the synagogue's traditional egalitarian minyan.[38] In 2016, he and his wife were honored by the Jewish Primary Day School of the Nation's Capital, where he chaired the annual Rabin lecture for many years.[39] He has served on the executive committee of the National Jewish Democratic Council and of Avodah.