Frank Donatelli

A long-time activist, Frank Donatelli is chairman of the Reagan Ranch Board of Governors and serves on Young America’s Foundation’s Board of Directors. Donatelli served as executive vice president and director of federal public affairs for McGuireWoods LLP from 2001 through 2018, when he became a senior advisor to the organization.

Donatelli is a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh and the American University Law School. During the 2008 Presidential race, Senator John McCain tapped Donatelli to serve as deputy chairman of the GOP where he coordinated the RNC’s fundraising and organizing activities directly with the McCain-Palin Presidential campaign.

His previous appointments have included serving as an assistant to President Ronald Reagan for political and intergovernmental affairs and as deputy assistant to the President for public liaison at the White House. He served on White House Chief of Staff James Baker’s team that negotiated Presidential debates in 1984. Donatelli was also a senior advisor to Bob Dole in 1996 and represented his campaign in debate negotiations.

Donatelli has more than 30 years of experience in public policy advocacy and boasts substantial expertise in the legislative process. He has represented a wide variety of companies in such diverse areas as energy, taxes and trade, telecommunication, and Homeland Security and has provided strategic advice and policy guidance to many large companies and trade associations.

He has also represented US victims of international terrorism and helped to enact legislation that resulted in compensation for the families of those killed in the Marine Barracks bombing in Lebanon in 1983 and families of U.S. victims killed in the destruction of two U.S. embassies in Africa in 1998. Funds were obtained from countries, including Iran—and intermediaries that facilitated these terrorist actions—not from U.S. taxpayers.

He has appeared on numerous public affairs programs on MSNBC, Fox News and CNN and is a noted writer whose articles have been printed in the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Washington Times, and New York Daily News.

In 1992, Donatelli chaired the Christopher Columbus Quincentennery Commission, which celebrated the 500th anniversary of Columbus’ arrival in the New World. From 2009 to 2014, Donatelli was Chair of GOPAC, the organization which trains and supports conservative legislators to be effective spokesmen and advocates for conservative policy proposals. During that time period, the number of conservative state legislators rose to numbers not seen since the 1920s.