Who Is Kellyanne Conway? 5 Things You Need To Know About The First Woman To Run A GOP Presidential Campaign

Image Credits: Photo via Gage Skidmore/Flickr (CC-BY-SA)

The Trump Campaign has experienced many changes over the last few weeks. But no change has been greater than the promotion of Kellyanne Conway to campaign manager after Paul Manafort announced his resignation. Conway’s promotion marks the first time a woman has ever run a Republican presidential campaign. Here are five things you need to know about Trump’s new leading woman.

1) She’s a veteran in politics.

Kellyanne Conway has been working in politics for more than 25 years. Her main role has been to advise Republican candidates on how to tap into the female vote. Before joining the Trump campaign, she ran a Ted Cruz super PAC known as Keep the Promise I. Besides Cruz and Trump, she has advised many Republican lawmakers including Newt Gingrich, Mike Pence, Michele Bachmann, and Steve King.

2) She’s a best-selling author.

In 2005, Kellyanne wrote a book in conjunction with Celinda Lake titled, What Women Really Want. The book describes how over the past decade, women have been enacting the most change across racial, class, religious, and political boundaries. Women have enacted this change, according to Conway and Lake, by taking charge of the most polarizing issues and creating new paths of opportunity by following their own set of rules.

3) She founded her own company.

In 1995, Conway founded and started The Polling Company which is a firm that uses statistical models to predict the outcomes of elections and to describe national trends on particular issues. Kellyanne currently serves as both CEO and President and her company was one of the only firms to correctly predict the winners of major midterm elections in 2012.

4) She’s a woman who can do both.

Kellyanne not only has a successful career but she’s also a wife and a mother. She’s married to George T. Conway III who is a litigation partner at a high profile law firm. George’s law firm once worked on a lawsuit which involved Bill Clinton. The couple and their four children currently reside in New York City.

5) She’s a former lawyer.

Before entering the rough and tumble world of politics, Conway was a practicing attorney. Besides being an attorney, she was also a judicial clerk in Washington D.C. and a professor at the George Washington University Law Center.

Her career in the public sector has been marked by both controversy and accomplishment. Love her or hate her, though, there is no denying that Kellyanne Conway might just possess the necessary skills and knowledge to successfully help forge the gap between Donald Trump and female voters.  Only time will tell.  

UPDATE 11/10/2016: With Trump’s victory on November 8th, Kellyanne Conway becomes the first female to run a successful presidential campaign.