Janine Shimomura is a strategic communications expert with a background in legislative and statewide advocacy.

Before consulting, she served as Director of Communications for ACLU California Action where she oversaw communications strategy for the organization’s legislative priorities and statewide advocacy. Prior to joining the ACLU, she worked as assistant director of strategy for Governor Gavin Newsom, where she coordinated message development, strategic planning, and developed statewide portals for emergency response and volunteer service opportunities. While there, she also served as a strategic advisor to California Surgeon General Dr. Nadine Burke Harris, amplifying her vision for the newly created office that works to address toxic stress and health equity across the state.

Before her work in the Newsom Administration, she served the Brown Administration as special assistant for communications at the California State Transportation Agency, helping oversee public affairs at eight state departments and working on the successful passage of the largest transportation revenue increase in California in more than 25 years. She also served as a research and press aide to then Attorney General Kamala D. Harris.

Shimomura has also worked to elect more women to public office, starting as an intern with Emerge California, then project director at WomenCount, and served on the board of California Women’s List as vice president of digital. Shimomura is a graduate of UC Berkeley, where she majored in media studies with a research focus on political communication.