Organizing Strategy and Practice

Cecilia Muñoz's Picture

Cecilia Muñoz

Cecilia Muñoz is a national leader in public policy and public interest technology with nearly three decades of experience in the non-profit sector and 8 years of service on President Obama’s senior team.  She is currently a Senior Advisor at New America, where she built a major initiative on public interest technology, and led locally-focused initiatives.  Prior to joining New America in 2017, she served for eight years on President Obama’s senior team, first as Director of Intergovernmental Affairs followed by five years as Director of the Domestic Policy Council.  Before working in government, she spent 20 years at the National Council of La Raza (now UNIDOS US), the nation’s largest Hispanic policy and advocacy organization.  Cecilia is also a Senior Fellow at Results for America, a nonprofit that advances the use of data and evidence in policy making.  She received a MacArthur Fellowship in 2000 for her work on immigration and civil rights, and is a trustee of the Kresge, MacArthur and Joyce Foundations.  She advises the Open Society and JPB Foundations, and serves on the boards of several nonprofit organizations.  In 2020, she published the award-winning More Than Ready: Be Strong and Be You...and Other Lessons for Women of Color on the Rise, which shares insights from her career as well as the careers of other notable women of color. Muñoz, a Detroit native and the daughter of immigrants from Bolivia, is also a wife and mother of two grown daughters. She lives with her husband in Maryland.