Jon Favreau

Jonathan Edward Favreau born June 2 1981 is an American political commentator podcaster and the former director of Speechwriting for President Barack Obama Favreau attended the College of the Holy Cross where he took part in andor directed numerous community and civic programs He also accumulated numerous scholastic honors before graduating as valedictorian After graduation he went to work for the John Kerry presidential campaign in 2004 working to collect talk radio news for the campaign and was promoted to the role of Deputy Speechwriter Favreau first met Barack Obama then a state Senator from Illinois while working on the Kerry campaign In 2005 Obamas communications director Robert Gibbs recommended Favreau to Obama as a speechwriter8 Favreau was hired as Obamas speechwriter shortly after Obamas election to the United States Senate Obama and Favreau grew close and Obama referred to him as his mind reader He went on the campaign trail with Obama during his successful presidential election campaign In 2009 he was named to the White House staff as Director of Speechwriting In January 2017 he cofounded liberal media company Crooked Media with fellow former Obama staffers Tommy Vietor and Jon Lovett and began cohosting the political podcast Pod Save America with Vietor Lovett and Dan Pfeiffer