Anita McBride
CCPS Fellow-in-Residence
ADV | Advancement Operations and Administration
Bio
Anita B. McBride is executive-in-residence at the Center for Congressional and Presidential Studies at American University’s School of Public Affairs, where she leads the First Ladies Initiative. She also serves as an advisor to the university's Sine Institute for Policy and Politics.
McBride is an internationally recognized expert on the legacies of American first ladies and operations of the White House. She is a founding member of the First Ladies Association for Research and Education (FLARE), a national organization affiliated with American University's School of Public Affairs that promotes research and education about the lives, contributions, and lasting legacies of U.S. first ladies. She co-authored Remember the First Ladies: The Legacies of America's History-Making Women, as well a first-of-its-kind textbook, U.S. First Ladies: Making History and Leaving Legacies, which fills a critical gap in academic literature on the study of first ladies and their accomplishments. She also co-authored a children's book, First Ladies Make History, published by the White House Historical Association.
She is co-chair of In Pursuit, a national civic education initiative of More Perfect in partnership with Substack, launched to mark America's 250th anniversary. This project, with support from AU’s First Ladies Initiative, features essays by presidents, first ladies, justices, historians, and military and civic leaders that reflect on lessons of U.S. leadership and connect our history to the pursuit of a more perfect union.
McBride's expertise on the White House and the influence of first ladies was acquired through her two decades of experience serving in senior roles under Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and George W. Bush in the White House and U.S. Department of State. She also served as Chief of Staff to First Lady Laura Bush and directed the first lady's work on a wide range of global and domestic initiatives and is one of the longest-tenured women in White House history.
McBride has also focused on elevating the influence and impact of first ladies around the world and co-founded the RAND African First Ladies Initiative and Fellowship program, now the Global First Ladies Alliance.
McBride is a highly sought-after speaker and media expert on first ladies, presidential transitions, and White House operations and has appeared on all major network and cable news outlets and in national print media. She also served as a consultant to HBO's Emmy-award winning series, Veep.
McBride is active in a number of organizations, including the White House Historical Association where she chairs the biennial Presidential Sites Summit – a convening of more than 200 presidential historic sites from across the nation to promote civic education and the understanding and appreciation of presidential history. She is a member of the International Republican Institute's Women's Democracy Network and vice chair of the National Italian American Foundation. She is also a member of the Government Affairs committee of the United States Semiquincentennial Commission (America 250), the congressional entity established to help plan the celebration of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of
Independence. McBride serves as a member of the Committee of Scholars of the Smithsonian American Women's History Museum and on the National Advisory Board for the National First Ladies Library.
