Scott Goodstein is a left-of-center advocacy organizer who runs the consulting firms Revolution Messaging and Catalyst Campaigns. He has been involved in launching several major political activist movements in the United States, including the Rock Against Bush campaign opposing the George W. Bush administration and several activism projects backing Democratic presidential candidates.

Goodstein later worked for both the Barack Obama 2008 and Bernie Sanders 2016 presidential campaigns. He claims to have “designed and executed” political campaigns and activist movements in a number of foreign countries, including Iraq, Israel, France, and Ukraine. Goodstein has collaborated with the left-of-center Brookings Institution and Milken Institute, as well as the South by Southwest media and entertainment conference, and he has held a lecturer position at American University in Washington, D.C. ¹ He also sits on several nonprofits’ boards of directors. ²

Personal Views

Goodstein is an abortion advocate and has supported states guaranteeing legal abortion in their constitutions following the Supreme Court’s June 2022 ruling that the United States Constitution does not confer a right to abortion. ^{3 4} He sits on the advisory board of the Abortion Access Front, a pro-abortion activist and performance art group backed by the Sixteen Thirty Fund and formerly known as the “Lady Parts Justice League.” ⁵ Goodstein has also endorsed placing restrictions on the Second Amendment right to firearm ownership. ⁶ In addition, he has called for Congress to pass legislation classifying social media platforms as publishers in order to hold them liable for the content they allow. ⁷

Scott Goodstein actively follows Israeli affairs in addition to his work in American politics. He has condemned right-of-center governments under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and called for Israel’s left-wing parties to oppose his administration more actively. ⁸

Goodstein has also claimed that Russia launched its 2022 invasion of Ukraine with the “goal of rebuilding the Soviet Union,” and he has pushed for the United States and its allies to send more weapons to the Ukrainians. In addition, he has called for the American public to donate to the Ukrainian military directly, including through an organization to support “Ukrainian LGBT Soldiers.” ⁹

Career

Goodstein started out as a band promoter and eventually began exploring the possibility of mobilizing fans of popular music subcultures in service of left-leaning political causes. In 2004, he launched the “Punk Voter” initiative, which was behind the “Rock Against Bush” music, activism, and left-wing voter turnout campaign. ^{10 11}

During the 2008 presidential election, he became the head of social networking strategy for then-U.S. Senator Barack Obama (D-IL). ^{12 13}  Obama raised more than $770 million for his campaign directly and nearly $1 billion in total for all election-related initiatives, breaking political fundraising records. The campaign relied on a combination of conventional fundraising techniques and then-innovative internet outreach. ¹⁴

According to INSEAD, a leading graduate-level business education and research institution, Goodstein “exploited significant changes in media consumption habits in US to the campaign’s advantage” as Obama’s external online director. He also oversaw a diversified online media strategy which included both “popular mainstream platforms” and “niche social networks that catered to different ethnic groups.” He also recruited well-known artists and performers to create pro-Obama content. ¹⁵

Catalyst Campaigns

Scott Goodstein founded his personal communications firm—originally called Scott Goodstein LLC but later rebranded as Catalyst Campaigns—in 1995. ¹⁶ Since then, the firm has worked with a wide variety of government and nonprofit clients. Catalyst Campaigns claims to have pioneered several mobile phone outreach tools during the 2007-2008 election cycle and created an early text message emergency notification system for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in 2009. The firm also collaborated with the NAACP on a mobile petition drive following the shooting of Trayvon Martin in Florida in 2012. In addition, Catalyst Campaigns has helped run political campaigns in foreign nations including Brazil and Israel. ¹⁷

Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Catalyst Campaigns issued a statement demanding that the United States and its allies become involved in the conflict by declaring a “no-fly zone” and attempting to interdict Russian airstrikes on Ukrainian territory. The firm also called on American and European citizens to send money to the Ukrainian military’s “emergency fund.” ¹⁸

Revolution Messaging

Scott Goodstein founded Revolution Messaging in 2009 together with several former Obama 2008 campaign staffers. In 2015, the Bernie Sanders 2016 presidential campaign hired Revolution Messaging to run its online advertising and fundraising. ¹⁹

Sanders 2016 Campaign

As a consultant to then-presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, Goodstein pushed the campaign to invest heavily into mobile marketing: in total, more than 40 percent of online contributors to Sanders donated on their phones. Goodstein also aimed to present Sanders as authentic and even “unwashed” by not insisting on a high level of polish for the campaign’s media: his photos videos were intentionally taken in a less professional style, and many of his fundraising emails were longer and denser than those of other candidates. According to the New Yorker, one video initially raised concerns from some campaign staffers because it went over length and off script, but ended up generating millions of interactions. ²⁰ In total, Revolution Messaging was responsible for bringing in at least $218 million worth of small donations to the campaign, according to the Huffington Post. ^{21 22}

O’Rourke 2018 Campaign

During the 2018 midterm election, Revolution Messaging became a top consultant to then-U.S. Representative Robert “Beto” O’Rourke (D-TX) during his failed Senate campaign. While O’Rourke insisted that he was “not poll-testing” and “not consulting with consultants” when he launched his campaign in March 2017, his Federal Election Commission filing a month later showed that he had already paid more than $20,000 to Revolution Messaging. By election time the following year, O’Rourke’s campaign had paid the firm more than $24 million. ²³

Controversy

The Huffington Post reported that Revolution Messaging went through a sexual misconduct scandal in 2016, when it allegedly let go an employee after she accused one of the firm’s partners of assaulting her at an office holiday event. Revolution Messaging denied that it terminated the employee as retaliation, claiming that she left several months later of her own accord. However, she and several former employees contradicted the firm’s story, insisting that she did not leave voluntarily and that she felt that she was under increased scrutiny after reporting the alleged assault. Goodstein received an email from another staffer who had witnessed suspected misconduct. The female employee has claimed that Goodstein called her letting her know she had been fired. ²⁴

In June 2018, Goodstein announced that he would be stepping down from his position as the chief executive officer of Revolution Messaging, though he indicated that he would remain with the firm as a partner. According to Buzzfeed, the move followed tensions within the firm over the sexual assault incident and plans by the staff to unionize. ²⁵

1. Scott Goodstein. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.scottgoodstein.com/
2. Scott Goodstein profile, LinkedIn, Accessed July 10, 2023. https://www.linkedin.com/in/scottgoodstein/
3. Scott Goodstein. “Marching forward one…” Twitter. July 5, 2023. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://twitter.com/goodstein/status/1676730441125228546
4. “Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.” Cornell Law School. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/dobbs_v._jackson_women%27s_health_organization_%282022%29
5. Scott Goodstein. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.scottgoodstein.com/
6. Scott Goodstein. “Building a wall…” August 4, 2019. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://twitter.com/goodstein/status/1158185096756768769
7. Scott Goodstein. “Has Facebook Learned Nothing?” Common Dreams. January 14, 2020. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.commondreams.org/views/2020/01/14/has-facebook-learned-nothing
8.  Ayelet Shani. “An Obama Adviser’s Tips for Netanyahu’s Rivals.” Haaretz. June 27, 2019. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/elections/2019-06-27/ty-article-magazine/.premium/stop-giving-the-bully-your-lunch-money-obama-advisers-tips-for-netanyahus-rival/0000017f-f473-d460-afff-ff77226f0000
9. Scott Goodstein. “10 Things Ukraine Needs Right Now.” The Smirking Chimp. February 28, 2022. Accessed July 9, 2023. http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/scott-goodstein/100567/10-things-ukraine-needs-right-now
10. Jacki Lyden. “Obama’s Social Media Guru On Marketing, Media, Music.” NPR. October 4, 2009. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113479844
11. “‘Punk Voter’ Slates ‘Rock Against Bush’ Tour.” Billboard. August 18, 2004. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.billboard.com/music/music-news/punk-voter-slates-rock-against-bush-tour-66868/
12. Jacki Lyden. “Obama’s Social Media Guru On Marketing, Media, Music.” NPR. October 4, 2009. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113479844
13. “‘Punk Voter’ Slates ‘Rock Against Bush’ Tour.” Billboard. August 18, 2004. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.billboard.com/music/music-news/punk-voter-slates-rock-against-bush-tour-66868/
14. John McCormick, Mike Dorning. “Barack Obama campaign raised nearly $1 billion, shattering records.” Chicago Tribune. December 5, 2008. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.chicagotribune.com/chi-obama-moneydec05-story.html
15. “How Obama used social networking tools to win.” INSEAD Knowledge. July 10, 2009. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://knowledge.insead.edu/entrepreneurship/how-obama-used-social-networking-tools-win
16. “Catalyst Campaigns.” Crunchbase. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/catalyst-campaigns
17. “Innovation.” Catalyst Campaigns. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://catalystcampaigns.com/innovation/
18. Scott Goodstein. “10 Things Ukraine Needs Right Now.” Catalyst Campaigns. February 28, 2022. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://catalystcampaigns.com/10-things-ukraine-needs-right-now/
19. Hayden Ludwig. “The Bernie Revolution’s Consultant of Choice.” Capital Research Center. November 16, 2018. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://capitalresearch.org/article/the-bernie-revolutions-consultant-of-choice/
20. Benjamin Wallace-Wells. “How the Sanders Campaign Got a Punk Sensibility.” The New Yorker. August 1, 2016. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.newyorker.com/news/benjamin-wallace-wells/how-the-sanders-campaign-got-a-punk-sensibility
21. Hayden Ludwig. “The Bernie Revolution’s Consultant of Choice.” Capital Research Center. November 16, 2018. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://capitalresearch.org/article/the-bernie-revolutions-consultant-of-choice/
22. Molly Redden. “A Progressive Firm Fired A Partner For Allegedly Assaulting A Female Staffer. Soon She Was Gone, Too.” HuffPost. February 23, 2018. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/revolution-messaging-assault-female-staffer_n_5a8cd12fe4b0273053a5baad
23. Hayden Ludwig. “The Bernie Revolution’s Consultant of Choice.” Capital Research Center. November 16, 2018. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://capitalresearch.org/article/the-bernie-revolutions-consultant-of-choice/
24. Molly Redden. “A Progressive Firm Fired A Partner For Allegedly Assaulting A Female Staffer. Soon She Was Gone, Too.” HuffPost. February 23, 2018. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/revolution-messaging-assault-female-staffer_n_5a8cd12fe4b0273053a5baad
25. Ruby Cramer. “The CEO Of A Top Progressive Digital Firm Has Stepped Down.” BuzzFeed News. June 6, 2018. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/rubycramer/rev-messaging-ceo