SKDKnickerbocker


SKDKnickerbocker is a public affairs and political consulting firm that specializes in working for Democratic Party politicians. It has offices in Washington, DC, New York City, Los Angeles, CA, and Albany, New York. The firm employs notable figures like former Obama White House Communications Director Anita Dunn, and Hilary Rosen.

History

The firm was formed in 2004 through the merger of Squier Knapp Dunn Communications and Knickerbocker Consulting. They formalized the merger in 2010, taking the name SKDKnickerbocker.
SKDK's political clients have included Barack Obama, Andrew Cuomo, Michael Bloomberg, and Christine Quinn. The firm was reportedly hired by women's rights and birth control advocate Sandra Fluke.
The firm's current and former public affairs clients include TransCanada Corporation, Association of American Railroads, the Rockefeller Foundation, AT&T, General Electric, Time Warner Facebook, Girls Who Code, NoVo Foundation, the Human Rights Campaign, the Center for Reproductive Rights, New American Leaders, the Obama Presidential Library, Paul Weiss Rifkind, General Mills, Pepsi Co, Nestle, Kellogg, Viacom, McDonalds, Students First, Families for Excellent Schools, Kaplan University, Amazon, Google, and Pfizer.
In October 2015, the firm was acquired by The Stagwell Group, of which Mark Penn is the principal, for an estimated $75 million.

Political consulting and communications

SKDKnickerbocker provides political consulting services to political candidates, campaigns, and issue advocacy groups. SKDKnickerbocker describes itself as a full-service public affairs practice that offers crisis communications, branding, marketing, media training, digital/social media advice, speech writing, and message development.
Ben White of Politico wrote in an April 2014 email blast that an unnamed senior Democrat said that "It's an open secret in the Dem consultant community that SKD has been signing up clients based on 'perceived White House access' tied to prior relationships and employment." Conservative website National Review Online noted that Rosen's name appears frequently on the White House visitor log. However, the firm does not meet the standard, legal definition of lobbying and is not registered to lobby the federal government.