Denise Cardinal is the Executive Director of WIN Minnesota, a state-based donor
collaborative that has been operating in the North Star for over a decade. She
has held several communications and political positions for various progressive
candidates, causes, campaigns, and elected officials for more than 20 years. She
was the Executive Director of ProgressNow, the network of
communications-centered advocacy organizations, after founding and running
the Minnesota affiliate – Alliance for a Better Minnesota – in 2007. Denise has
also served as a Senior Press Officer for the National Education Association and
as Press Secretary for U.S. Senator Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) after beginning her
career as a newspaper reporter. She was on the board for the Minnesotans
United for All Families, which was the first statewide campaign to beat back an
anti-gay-marriage amendment in 2012, was on the board of the State Innovative
Exchange, serves on the Minnesota Voice c3 table board, on the Advisory board
for the Funders Committee for Civic Participation (FCCP). She is the first in her
family to attend and graduate from college (Drake University), and lives in Saint
Paul with her two kids, two cats and one brown rescue dog.