Jeff Birnbaum

Jeff Birnbaum, a principal at BGR, heads its public relations offering. He leads a team in Washington that gives strategic advice to coalitions, companies and governments about handling the media and issue campaigns. An award-winning journalist, Jeff has worked for the premier news outlets in the United States.

Jeff, who joined BGR in 2010, has advised trade associations, multinational corporations, coalitions, international organizations and foreign governments. He has helped conduct proxy battles, run issue campaigns, design digital communications, manage coalitions, introduce new trade association CEOs and protect clients’ reputations during crises. On behalf of a wide range of clients, he has worked with international, national and regional media.

His experience prior to joining BGR includes serving as a White House, congressional and tax reporter for the Wall Street Journal, a senior political correspondent for Time Magazine, Washington bureau chief for Fortune Magazine and a columnist for the Washington Post. He is also the author of five books about Washington including the award-winning “Showdown at Gucci Gulch,” which he wrote with Alan S. Murray, and “Fifty Years of Business Roundtable: The Voice of America’s Leading CEOs in Washington,” for which he led a writing team. In 1994, he won the Aldo Beckman Memorial Award for his coverage of the White House.

Jeff was a longtime contributor to Fox News Channel and a columnist for the Washington Times, where he served as Managing Editor – Digital in charge of multimedia and online news. In that role, Jeff helped oversee a newsroom staff of more than 170 and was involved in editing and orchestrating major-story coverage. He also founded a subscriber-based news service directed at industry leaders who wanted premium information about Washington policy and politics. In addition, Jeff oversaw the TV and radio operations.

Jeff was a columnist for the Washington Post for more than four years, covering the intersection of business and government. Prior to working at the Post, he spent seven years as the chief of Fortune magazine’s Washington bureau and two years as a senior political correspondent for Fortune’s sister publication, Time. Before joining Time in 1995, Jeff worked for the Wall Street Journal for 16 years.

Jeff’s first book, “Showdown at Gucci Gulch,” was published in 1987 and won the American Political Science Association’s coveted Carey McWilliams Award in 1988. In 1992, Jeff’s second book, “The Lobbyists,” was a Washington Post bestseller. “Madhouse,” Jeff’s third book, about President Clinton’s White House, was published in 1996. His fourth book, “The Money Men,” examines campaign fundraising and was published in 2000. For his fifth book, Jeff was hired by Business Roundtable in 2022 to write the prestigious organization’s definitive history.

As a political analyst for Fox News Channel for 18 years, Jeff was featured on Fox News’ Special Report as one of the show’s “Fox All Stars” and on several other Fox News programs as well as the Fox Business Network. He also appeared on Fox News Radio as its political analyst. He served as chairman of the Bryce Harlow Foundation, Washington’s leading organization of government affairs professionals, and was a longtime member of the board of the National Press Foundation.