Nanette Farag serves as vice president of political affairs for Randle Communications. She leads the firm’s high-profile political affairs projects as well as its state and local ballot measure practice focusing on campaign strategy and execution, coalition building, strategic message development, grassroots outreach, voter targeting, and digital and paid advertising programs.
Farag is a dynamic and skilled strategist and tactician with executive experience in state government, the legislature, political campaigns and local initiatives. With a special focus on local public affairs, she has successfully executed complex projects across California with focuses on land use, health care, and education.
Farag has more than 20 years of experience leading strategic operations, political campaigns and external relations for high-profile public affairs projects and elected officials. She served as chief of staff to two Assemblymembers, and as a political advisor for some of the top targeted political races in the state. By utilizing performance-driven analysis in both the state and elections operation, the campaigns she led became the model for running and winning the most hard-fought races in the state.
During her career, Farag launched and led some of the most groundbreaking public policy initiatives in the state. She organized the nation’s first state-sponsored coalition on children’s internet safety, in partnership with public and private organizations, including the U.S. Attorney General. Farag also spearheaded legislation making California the first state in the nation to create open access to publicly funded research, modeled after the National Institute of Health.
Before joining Randle, she worked as the director of member support and communications for the Assembly Republican Caucus, expanding the operational model she developed for highly targeted political races to other legislative offices. In her time at the Caucus, Farag worked to modernize operations and developed effective, district-driven public affairs and outreach campaigns for legislators, leveraging data and analytics to personalize each outreach campaign, more than doubling both the volume and effectiveness of strategic communications campaigns.
Farag started her career in the State Senate and later served in the administration of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger as a member of the governor’s executive staff. She was later appointed as deputy director of external affairs at the California Department of Consumer Affairs, and worked as chief deputy coalitions director for Meg Whitman’s gubernatorial campaign.
Farag earned a Bachelor of Arts in Government from California State University, Sacramento. A passionate community volunteer and nature lover, Nanette and her husband spend much of their free time hiking, birding, volunteering for local animal rescue organizations and traveling with their rescue dog, Holly.