Executive Office

Mary Beth Maxwell
Executive Director

Mary Beth Maxwell is the founding Executive Director of American Rights at Work, a national advocacy organization launched in 2003 to advance workers’ rights to organize and collectively bargain.  In its brief history, she has led the organization in exposing unionbusting in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, monitoring decisions of the National Labor Relations Board, and informing the policy debate on workers’ freedom to form unions through original research studies.

» Read Mary Beth's full bio  

David Bonior
Chair (on leave 2007-2008)

David Bonior is the Chair of American Rights at Work.  He also serves as University Professor of Labor Studies at Wayne State University; and on the boards of Public Citizen and Community Central Bank in Mount Clemens, MI. 

Elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1976, he served the people of Macomb and St. Clair Counties for 26 years-the longest tenure of any Congressman from this district.  When he retired at the end of 2002, he had held the position of Democratic Whip, the second ranking Democrat in the House, for ten years.

» Read David's full bio

Kimberly Freeman
Deputy Director

For more than 13 years, Kimberly Freeman has served the progressive community as a senior communications strategist and publicist. Previously, as Director of Communications for the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial, she developed and managed national and international media campaigns on domestic social justice issues and international human rights. As an independent public relations consultant, she has designed national public relations projects for clients including the Children’s Defense Fund, the Smithsonian Institution and the National Breast Cancer Coalition. Freeman previously served as Director of Communications for American Rights at Work.

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Portia Hickson
Executive Assistant

Communications

Liz Cattaneo
Communications Director

Elizabeth Bukey
Communications Assistant

Josh Goldstein
Press Secretary

Beth Handy
Communications and Publications Coordinator

Jon Steed
Writer

Michael Whitney
New Media Coordinator

Julie Martínez Ortega
Director of Research

Before joining our staff, Julie Martínez Ortega was a Kerr White Visiting Scholar with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. She also practiced civil rights litigation with Hadsell & Stormer, Inc. of Los Angeles, California, and worked on Capitol Hill as a Special Assistant to Senator Alan Cranston. She is a graduate of Stanford University, the UCLA School of Law, and the Heller Graduate School of Brandeis University.  She is a member of the California Bar Association.  

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Erin Johansson
Research Associate

Erin Johansson has worked as a Research Associate for American Rights at Work since 2004. Her recent publications include "Checking Out: The Rise of Wal-Mart and the Fall of Middle Class Retail Jobs" in the Connecticut Law Review, and two American Rights at Work reports, Fed Up With FedEx: How FedEx Ground Tramples Workers’ Rights and Civil Rights, and Broken Promises: Verizon neglects its commitment to provide good jobs and quality service. Erin also writes the Eye on the NLRB blog. She holds a Master of Public Policy degree from the University of Maryland College Park, and a Bachelor of Arts from Skidmore College, where she was elected to the Phi Beta Kappa Society.  Erin is a member of the Labor and Employment Relations Association and as serves as a Co-Chair of the Labor Studies Committee.

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Velina Petrova
Research Analyst

Partnerships & Outreach

Jane Norman
Director, Partnerships and Outreach

Jane Norman brings over 10 years of experience in program design, training, and nonprofit management to American Rights at Work.

Previously, as a Program Director at Advocates for Youth, she led a multi-year public health education project with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to reduce the rates of HIV/AIDS infection among adolescents.  She established a national clearinghouse to strengthen the design and delivery of adolescent health programs, provided training and technical assistance to youth-serving institutions and professionals, authored articles and publications, built networks of youth leaders, and led lobbying delegations to the UN Special Sessions on Children and HIV/AIDS.  She has also served as a training consultant to the UN Population Fund, where she designed and led advocacy trainings in Bosnia and Panama.

She currently sits on the Board of the Office of Minority Health Resource Center.

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Joe Wantz
Outreach Assistant

Rebecca Wasserman
Senior Outreach Associate

Socially Responsible Business Program

Nikki Daruwala
Director, Socially Responsible Business Program

Nikki Daruwala brings 20 years of labor policy, corporate advocacy, and management experience to her current position.  Prior to joining American Rights at Work, she was Manager for Advocacy and Social Policy at Calvert, a leading socially responsible mutual fund company. She has worked with several major U.S. and international corporations in developing comprehensive workplace policies and programs. Previously, she was employed by the Food and Allied Service Trades Department of the AFL-CIO and the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW), where she led and was instrumental in advocacy campaigns to help workers gain union representation and bargaining rights.

Daruwala is a founding member of the Child Labor Coalition, and has served as Chairperson of the Indigenous Rights Committee and the Diversity Committee at the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR) and on the Shareholder Advisory and Policy Committee Board of the Social Investment Forum (SIF).  She currently serves on the Advisory Committee for the Institute for Women’s Policy Research (IWPR) and the Board of Co-op America.

She is a graduate of Ithaca College and holds an MS in industrial and labor relations from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst.

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Administration

Lorenzo Di Silvio
Administrative Assistant

Development

Alicia Daly
Development Director