A woman who grew up in western Illinois and went on to work in national politics is encouraging others to be engaged in the process.
“The only way to make a difference and make change is to show up, lean in, and work hard,” said Anne Hathaway, President and CEO of Hathaway Strategies, a public affairs firm based in Indianapolis, Ind.
Hathaway, who is also the Republican National Committeewoman for Indiana, was the keynote speaker for the McDonough County Republican Central Committee’s annual Lincoln Day Dinner.
Hathaway said those engaged in politics don’t have to agree on everything, but they should be willing to work together, even if it requires some give-and-take. She said currently there’s a hard right and a hard left in the nation’s politics and neither seems willing to move toward the middle.
“We’re throwing insults more than we’re sitting down and having discussions on how to solve real problems,” she said.
Hathaway grew up in Galva. She was an interior design major at the University of Illinois when she sat next to state senator Ken McMillan, a western Illinois Republican, during a luncheon.
Their conversation convinced Hathaway that she wanted to get involved in politics, and after graduating she worked for McMillan’s first campaign for congress.
McMillan defeated incumbent Congressman Tom Railsback in the Republican primary in 1982 before losing to Democrat Lane Evans in the general election. He also lost to Evans in the 1984 congressional election.
Hathaway said her first official job with McMillan’s campaign was as yard sign coordinator.
“I was in a big barn outside of Bushnell and putting together yard signs,” she said.
Hathaway said the experience taught her about grassroots politics at the local level. She also learned about going door-to-door, running phone banks, even about getting a candidate into parades.
Hathaway later worked for Vice President Dan Quayle as assistant to the vice president and director of scheduling and public liaison.
After the Bush-Quayle ticket lost its reelection bid in 1992, Quayle returned to his home state of Indiana and asked Hathaway to continue working for him. That’s how she ended up in Indianapolis.
Hathaway said a high school guidance counselor told her that politics was not a career but rather was a hobby and that she needed the interior design degree to fall back on.
“Obviously, over the years, politics has become a multi-billion-dollar business and I was able to develop it into a long career,” she said.
She believes in face-to-face campaigning, and said candidates should be willing to listen to voters.
“And not only listen, but hear, and act upon what you hear as opposed to what you want to hear,” Hathaway said.
She thinks AI can have a role in campaigns, but said it’s new and there’s still a learning curve with it.
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