Aneesh Raman is Senior Advisor on Economic Strategy and External Affairs to California GovernorGavin Newsom. Prior to this appointment, Raman spent five years in the tech industry, most recently as Head of Economic and Social Impact Policy at Facebook. Raman previously held a number of positions in the Obama Administration, including as a speechwriter to the President of the United States, Barack Obama, making him the country's first Indian-American Presidential Speechwriter. Raman details his experience as President Obama's speechwriter in a chapter in . Before joining the Obama Administration, Raman was an award-winning CNN war correspondent and the network's first correspondent based in the Middle East responsible for region-wide coverage. He began his television career while in college, earning a local Emmy Award for anchoring Kids Talk Sports, a weekly sports talk show that aired on New England Cable News. A graduate of Harvard College and a former Fulbright scholar, Raman is a member of the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library's New Frontier Award Committee and a former term member at the Council on Foreign Relations.
CNN career
As CNN's Middle East correspondent, Raman was based in Egypt but was largely responsible for coverage out of Iran. Over the course of a dozen trips, Raman reported extensively on Iran's nuclear ambitions and the growing frustration of the people towards their government. From 2005 to 2006, Raman was CNN's Baghdad Correspondent, living in Iraq during an exceptionally volatile period in the Iraq War. In addition to embedding with US forces across the country, he provided some of the most comprehensive reporting on Iraq's National Assembly and the efforts to ratify a new constitution. Raman also provided in-depth coverage of the Saddam Hussein trial and was notably the first American television journalist to announce Saddam Hussein's execution. In 2014, Raman appeared on television a number of times to discuss the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant's offensive in Iraq. Raman's initial international posting was in Bangkok, Thailand, where he was the first Western reporter to go live from Phuket, Thailand after the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake. Raman spent weeks covering the aftermath of the resulting tsunami and was part of the CNN team that won a 2005 Alfred I. duPont–Columbia University Award. While at CNN, Raman reported from a number of countries including Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, England, Spain, Nicaragua, India, Japan, Thailand, Cambodia, Singapore, Philippines and Indonesia. In July 2007, he gave a speech at the Clinton School of Public Service about his experiences as a foreign correspondent and the changes taking place in cable news. Raman first appeared on CNN in 2004, when he profiled the younger generation and their involvement in the American 2004 presidential election. In June 2008, Raman left CNN and later joined the U.S. presidential campaign of Democrat Barack Obama.
Obama Administration
After joining the presidential campaign of Barack Obama as part of the communications team set up for vice presidential nominee Joe Biden, Raman became speechwriter to Treasury SecretaryTimothy Geithner during the 2008 financial crisis and ensuing recession. Raman subsequently worked on strategic communications at The Pentagon before joining the White House staff as a Presidential Speechwriter, where he focused on domestic policy and was the principal speechwriter on immigration reform.
Post-Obama Administration
Raman's first job after leaving the White House was at OZY Media. He started out as a Senior Editor but soon had his role expanded to include all of marketing and communications. Raman went on to become VP of Growth at RaiseMe, a social impact startup expanding access to higher education., and later joined Facebook as Head of Economic and Social Impact Policy. In that role, he helped launch Community Boost, a global training program for small businesses.
Personal life
Raman graduated from Harvard College magna cum laude and was a Fulbright Scholar. He grew up in Wellesley, Massachusetts and went to Wellesley High School. Raman married Dr. Haley Naik in 2012 after they were introduced to one another by a mutual friend.
