National Advisory Council: 2014
Katie Merrill is one of California’s most successful female and LGBT campaign managers and statewide consultants. She is a partner in the nationally-recognized political consulting, direct mail, and media firm, BaughmanMerrill, which is based in San Francisco.
Over the course of her career, Katie has advised and run over a dozen statewide initiative and candidate campaigns in California. Most recently, she helped Eleni Kounalakis and HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra become the first elected woman Lt. Governor and Latino Attorney General respectively in California history, and helped Controller Betty Yee win re-election by a record-smashing 8 million votes—making her the top vote getter in the state and the country in 2018.
In 2020, Katie served as Chief National Direct Mail Consultant to Tom Steyer for President—overseeing strategy, content, and delivery of over 12 million pieces of mail in five early voting states.
Katie served as chief strategist for California’s Prop 35, the anti-human trafficking initiative, which garnered over 81% of the vote and 10 million votes—more than any other initiative in U.S. history.
Katie has spent much of her career working to elect women to all levels of elected office, including city council, mayor, county supervisor, State Assembly and Senate, U.S. Senate, and President of the United States.
Katie is frequently sought after by the media for comment on politics and elections. She is a graduate of Amherst College and lives near Berkeley, California.
