Gloria Feldt

Gloria Feldt is the leading expert and an expert leader on women, politics, and health from where the personal meets the political. She is the author of three books: The War on Choice: The Right-Wing Attack on Women’s Rights and How to Fight Back (Bantam), Behind Every Choice Is a Story (University of North Texas Press), and Send Yourself Roses: Thoughts on Life, Love, and Leading Roles (written with Kathleen Turner, Springboard). Her website is www.GloriaFeldt.com; her blog is www.GloriaFeldt.com/heartfeldt-politics-blog.

People Magazine called her “the voice of experience”. Feldt was a teen mom from West Texas who rose to become president and CEO of the nation’s largest reproductive health care and sexuality education provider and advocate, Planned Parenthood Federation of America. She left Planned Parenthood in 2005 and is now a noted national speaker, author and television guest, a regular commentator for Women’s e-News, Huffington Post, and BlogHer. She is a board member of the Women’s Media Center.

Well versed in red-state politics from the ground up before assuming her national leadership role, Gloria made Planned Parenthood a political powerhouse, and led the creation of its bold “Vision for 2025”. She led the reproductive rights, health, and justice movement to “fight forward”, changing strategy from merely reacting to advancing its own initiatives, successfully obtaining insurance coverage for contraception, wider access to emergency contraception, spearheading The Prevention First Act and the updated Freedom of Choice Act now before Congress.

Gloria’s commentary has appeared in The New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post, Salon, Alternet, and numerous other print and web-based publications and blogs including ELLE and More magazines, and she is often quoted by these publications. She has appeared on a variety of national news and public affairs programs, including: NPR’s “Morning Edition” and “Fresh Air”, the Today Show, Good Morning America, The News Hour with Jim Lehrer, The O’Reilly Factor, Hardball with Chris Matthews, and The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. She’s also contributed chapters to several books, most recently Our Bodies Ourselves, Menopause, Becoming Ourselves: Reflections on Growing up Female, and Abortion Under Attack: Women on the Challenges Facing Choice.

Vanity Fair magazine named Gloria Feldt one of the “top 200 women legends, leaders, and trailblazers” and Glamour magazine honored her as a “Woman of the Year.” She is one of Women’s e-News 21 Leaders for the 21st century. She and her husband, Alex Barbanell, have a combined family of six children, nine grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren. They live in New York and Arizona.