Jon Favreau

Jonathan Edward Favreau is an American political commentator and podcaster and the former director of speechwriting for President Barack Obama. After graduating from the College of the Holy Cross as valedictorian, Favreau worked for the John Kerry presidential campaign in 2004, working to collect talk radio news for the campaign and was promoted to the role of Deputy Speechwriter. Favreau first met Barack Obama, then a state senator from Illinois, while working on the Kerry campaign. In 2005, Obama's communications director Robert Gibbs recommended Favreau to Obama as a speechwriter. Favreau was hired as Obama's speechwriter shortly after Obama's election to the United States Senate. Obama and Favreau grew close, and Obama referred to him as his "mind reader". He went on the campaign trail with Obama during his successful presidential election campaign. In 2009, he was named to the White House staff as Director of Speechwriting. After starting the well received and Grassroots podcast “Keeping it 1600” via “The Ringer” media group in March of 2017, he co-founded liberal media company Crooked Media with fellow former Obama staffers Tommy Vietor and Jon Lovett, and began co-hosting the political podcast Pod Save America with Vietor, Lovett, and Dan Pfeiffer.