Cassandra Q. Butts, Senior Vice President for Domestic Policy

Cassandra Q. Butts is the Senior Vice President for Domestic Policy at American Progress. Prior to joining American Progress, she was a senior advisor to Rep. Richard A. Gephardt (D-MO) and served as the policy director on his 2004 presidential campaign. Butts coordinated the formulation of policy on Rep. Gephardt's presidential campaign that included a universal health care plan. In her seven years of work for Rep. Gephardt during his tenure as the House Democratic Leader, Butts was a principal advisor on matters involving the judiciary, financial services, and information technology. She provided counsel and strategic advice to the Democratic Leader on a range of major proposals that came before the U.S. Congress including the 1998 presidential impeachment and legislation related to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, which included drafting the groundbreaking September 11th Victim Compensation Fund of 2001. Butts most recently served as a senior advisor to Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) in 2004-2005.

 

Prior to her service at the Center, Butts was an Assistant Counsel for the NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund, where she worked on civil rights policy and litigated voting rights and school desegregation cases. She also served as Legislative Counsel to Sen. Harris L. Wofford (D-PA). Butts also served as an international election observer to the Zimbabwe parliamentary elections in 2000. She is a graduate of Harvard Law School and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Email: cbutts /@\ americanprogress.org

Articles by Cassandra Q. Butts