Donnie Fowler

Donnie Fowler (born 1967) is an American entrepreneur and political activist from Columbia, South Carolina, who now lives in San Francisco. He has worked in the technology, telecommunications, and political world for more than 25 years.

Fowler has worked in the Clinton White House, at the Federal Communications Commission, as vice president at Silicon Valley’s TechNet, and as a founder of two companies that cross the technology and public spaces. His firm, Dogpatch Strategies, and his partnerships with various companies center around business development and strategic communications for organizations that are leading innovators in their space and that often provide a public good. For example, he led Facebook's first efforts into political campaigns during the 2006 congressional elections, organized California's clean tech industry in its successful fight to protect the state's clean energy law (known as AB32) during 2012's Proposition 23 fight, and has an ongoing senior business development role with PredPol, a company founded in 2012 that provides crime prediction software to police in the United States and abroad.

In politics, Fowler has worked at the state and national level on the presidential campaigns of Dick Gephardt, Jesse Jackson, Bill Clinton, Al Gore, Wes Clark, John Kerry, and Barack Obama. He also worked as a Clinton White House staffer as a liaison to Congress for presidential appointments and as a presidential appointee at the Federal Communications Commission where he dealt with broadband Internet, cable television, and satellite issues.

Fowler was Al Gore's National Field & Delegates Director during the 2000 presidential campaign, managing the in-state political operations for Gore's victory over Bill Bradley for the Democratic nomination and the popular vote victory over George W. Bush in the general election. He was General Wesley Clark's first campaign manager in 2003 ran John Kerry's 2004 winning campaign in the state of Michigan, and was senior advisor in Indiana for Barack Obama's victory there (the first time a Democratic presidential candidate won the Hoosier state since 1964).

Following the 2004 election, Fowler ran for the DNC Chairmanship, receiving the second highest-level of support behind eventual winner and former Vermont governor Howard Dean. Similar to Dean, Fowler called for the Democratic Party to broaden its approach to voters and look to state and county parties for its message and its growth.

Fowler is a graduate of the University of Virginia and the University of South Carolina School of Law. He is the son of former Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chairman Donald Fowler.