Meet the CR Team
Zach Howell - National Chairman
Zach Howell is a native of Sandy, Utah. He grew up loving politics and volunteered for his first campaign at the age of 13. In High School, Zach remained heavily involved in politics and was a State Champion in Debate. While still in High School, Zach began his involvement in College Republicans when he helped coordinate Get Out The Vote activities among High School and college students for a Congressional campaign.
Toward the end of his Freshman year in College, Zach ran for State Chairman of the Utah Federation of College Republicans and won. He was reelected unanimously the following year. While Zach was State Chair, the Utah Federation of College Republicans doubled its membership and every major campus in the state had an active CR Chapter. In 2005 and 2006, the Utah College Republicans participated in campaigns all over the country, culminating in the deployment of hundreds of Utah CRs through the RNC deployment program in 2006. In recognition of his efforts, Zach was named the “Best State Chairman” of the CRNC in 2006.
Zach continued his involvement with College Republicans by running for Western Region Vice-Chairman in 2007. During his time in this position, Zach has helped start new State Federations, aided in volunteer deployment between states and raised money for the CRNC.
Besides his activities in College Republicans, Zach has interned for the White House, a Utah Congressman and numerous campaigns. He managed the campaign of Utah’s State House Speaker in 2008.
Just as Zach helped bring the Utah College Republicans to a new level, he will build upon the success of the CRNC to make it a better, stronger organization.
Jeremy Hagen- Co-chairman
Jeremy is a Missouri native and has lived in many parts of the state, including Kansas City, St. Louis, Springfield and Columbia.
Jeremy began his involvement in politics in 2006 as an intern for state Senator Norma Champion. In the midst of the 2006 election, Jeremy continued his involvement as the Vice-Chair of the Missouri State University College Republicans, helping to re-start the conservative presence on Missouri’s second largest university. As a result of his efforts in 2006, Jeremy became Vice-Chairman of the Missouri College Republicans. He served in that position for several months before being appoingted Executive Director.
More recently, Jeremy was elected Chairman of the Missouri College Republicans, and currently serves in that capacity. While Jeremy was Chairman in 2008, the Missouri CRs made 250.000 voter contacts, contributed 20,000 volunteer hours and recruited 10,000 new College Republicans. The Missouri College Republicans played a crucial role in helping John McCain win in Missouri, which was the only battleground state to end up in the Republican column. Missouri is also the only state in the country where Republicans picked up State Senate seats where they were in control of the chamber.
Jeremy is excited to talk with hundreds of CRs during the campaign about making the CRNC stronger and more effective.
Chandler Harris - National Secretary
Chandler is a native of Music City U.S.A. aka. Nashville, Tennessee, but attends school on the beautiful rolling hills of East Alabama at Auburn University. He has been involved in politics and working political campaigns since he was 15 years old and has worked on over 10 campaigns for public office on a local, state and national level in that time.
Chandler is entering his second term as the State Chairman for the College Republican Federation of Alabama, after previously serving at the Political Director and Chairman of the Auburn University College Republicans. As State Chairman of the College Republican Federation of Alabama Chandler oversaw a massive coordination of CR’s all over the state of Alabama, making tens of thousands of voter contacts which impacted races all over the state and aided in John McCain’s 21 point victory over Barack Obama in Alabama. In recognition of his efforts, Chandler became part of the Alabama Republican Party Steering Committee.
Chandler is a senior majoring in Economics with a minor in Political Science and has interned with three different Members of Congress in Capitol Hill: Marsha Blackburn TN-7, Tom Price GA-6, and Mike Rogers AL-3.
In his free time he enjoys good country music, not the garbage they play today, Auburn Tiger and Vanderbilt Commodore football, and water skiing.
Brand Kroeger - National Treasurer
Brand Kroeger was born and raised in Destin, Florida, along what is affectionately known as the ‘Redneck Riviera.’ He has been involved with Republican politics from a young age working on the Mel Martinez for US Senate campaign as well as serving as Chairman of Youth for Bush in Northwest Florida in 2004.
Brand is the current Chair of the DC Federation of College Republicans and the George Washington University College Republicans. During the 2008 election cycle, Brand led the DC Federation in making more than 110,000 voter contacts helping other federations in PA, VA, OH, CO, and MD. During his involvement, the DC Federation was recognized as the ‘Best State Federation’ in America and the GW Chapter was named ‘Best Chapter’.
As a senior double-majoring in Political Science and International Affairs at The George Washington University, Brand has been blessed by the ability to take advantage of GW’s unique location in Washington. He has worked for former Florida House of Representatives Speaker Ray Sansom, and interned for U.S. Senator Jim Bunning R-KY and Congressman Vern Buchanan R-FL. Brand also served as a Yitzhak Rabin Fellow at the Israeli Embassy in 2007.
As treasurer, Brand will work with Zach and Jeremy to continue sound fiscal responsibility at the CRNC. He will work to ensure accountability when money is spent and excellence when money is raised.
In his free time, Brand enjoys wrestling alligators back in his home state of Florida.
Rudy Perciful Jr. is a lifelong resident of Louisiana. He got his start in politics at the age of eighteen, serving as a driver and intern for the Boustany for Congress race. Boustany only had 7% of the vote at the time, he would go on to win the election in a landslide; being the first Republican elected to the Louisiana 7th Congressional District since the reconstruction.
He then transferred to Louisiana State University where he got involved with the local College Republican Chapter and served as the Campaigns Chair. He went on to be elected as the 1st Vice Chair for the LFCR, then Chairman a year later. During his two years with LFCR, the organization doubled in size. Governor Bobby Jindal was elected in 2007 and five of the top seven seats in state government switched to the Republican Party. Last year, after the LFCR made a strong effort in the 6th Congressional District, Republican Bill Cassiday beat incumbent Democrat Don Cazayoux in a close race, making the district one of very few Republican pickups in 2008. He graduated Louisiana State University in 2008 with a degree in Finance with a concentration in Investments.
Rudy now works to raise money for charitable organizations in Louisiana and is the Deputy Director of Public Affairs for a New Orleans based firm.
Pete Vitale- Midwest Regional Vice-Chairman
Since the age of seventeen, Pete Vitale has immersed himself in grassroots GOP politics. His political career began as a volunteer on the George W. Bush for President campaigns as well as numerous Michigan legislative campaigns. He interned for the Dick DeVos for Governor Campaign in Michigan while acting as the Oakland University College Republican Chairman. During the last election cycle, Pete served as the Students for McCain Chairman in Michigan and was elected by the MI 12th Congressional District as a delegate to the Republican National Convention in Minnesota.
Pete served as Treasurer of the Michigan Federation of College Republicans and currently operates as the Chairman of the MFCR. Additionally, Pete was recently elected by the delegates of the Michigan Republican State Convention as the Youth Chairman of the MIGOP. In this capacity, Pete functions as one of the six Vice Chairman of the State Party.
Currently, Pete is visiting every college campus in the State of Michigan, preparing for a Special Election in the Michigan Senate in November 2009.
Email Pete
Terence Grado- Northeastern Regional Vice-Chairman
Terence Grado was born and raised in New Jersey, and at an early age, he became very interested in politics. He credits his start in political activism with being elected Student Council President in high school. He worked to bring positive change to the school through several committees, organizations, and clubs, and even sat on his township’s school board, where his love of public service began.
Similarly, he was very active in college. One activity was the College Republicans, where Terence was soon elected Chairman for two consecutive years. Under his leadership, his chapter was named “Chapter of the Year” in NJ. Terence was also elected Co-Chairman of the NJ State Federation of College Republicans, and then Chairman (2008-2009). As Chairman, he doubled the amount of chapters in the state, greatly built-up existing chapters, and got College Republicans across NJ involved in campaigns. He also served as the Co-Chairman for NJ Youth for McCain.
Terence has been involved in dozens of campaigns on the national, state, and local levels. In addition, he has held several jobs/internships: he was a legislative staffer in the NJ State House for the Assembly Republicans, a legislative aide to NJ state Senator Steven V. Oroho, Assistant to the Manager of Ridgewood, NJ, a staffer at the Princeton Public Affairs Group– NJ’s most influential government affairs firm, etc. He is also active in non-political activities, such as the Knights of Columbus and is a black belt in martial arts.
Recently, Terence graduated from The College of New Jersey (TCNJ) with a B.A. in Political Science and a B.A. in Philosophy. He is currently running for Republican County Committee in NJ and will be working in politics until he goes to law school in the near future. He looks forward to building a better CRNC and Republican Party, as well as winning elections across the country, especially the Governorship in NJ!
Oh, and yes, he is Italian.
Michael Antonopoulos- Western Regional Vice-Chairman
Michael Antonopoulos is a lifelong resident of California. Michael has had a strong interest in Politics from a young age. While in high school, Michael served on the San Jose Youth Commission, where his primary focus was connecting young students and helping them to become more politically involved. Upon entering Saint Mary’s College, Michael became an active member of the College Republicans as well as St. Mary’s Student Government.
He served the College Republicans at the chapter level as Events Coordinator during his sophomore year, and was additionally elected to CCR Bay Area Regional Vice-Chair, where he pioneered CCR’s Facebook Communication Project and began coordinating regional social and activism events. At the conclusion of his junior year, Michael was unanimously elected CCR Administrative Vice-Chair, where he established regional communication projects and pushed Regional Vice-Chairs to take a more active role in planning and coordinating activism and events. Michael now serves as the Chairman of the California College Republicans and is working to make one of the nation’s largest federations even larger and more effective.
In addition to his efforts for the College Republicans, Michael served as State Chair of Students for McCain. As State Chair, Michael oversaw the chartering of over 50 Students for McCain chapters across the state and pushed volunteers to make over 75,000 phone calls for McCain-Palin 2008. Along with the campaign activities, Michael organized and implemented several events and rallies across the state.
Michael understands the importance of grassroots activism, having worked on several political campaigns, including the State Assembly campaigns of Abram Wilson, Paul Hegyi, Shirley Horton and Martin Garrick, as well as Phil Thalheimer’s campaign for San Diego City Council. As CCR Chairman, Michael will utilize the skills he obtained from his campaign experience, including experience in communications, technology outreach, and grassroots activism. Michael has seen firsthand how grassroots activism, communications and technology can advance a cause or candidate, and will bring this experience to the CRNC.
Tierra Warren- Finance Director
Born in Phoenix, Arizona but raised in San Diego, California, Tierra became involved in politics at the high school level. She was class president all four years and served on the Board of Education for Oceanside Unified School district.
In 2004, Tierra started college at the University of California Santa Barbara where she got involved in college republicans. In 2006, she was a field rep for the California College Republicans where she started new college republican clubs and recruited unprecidented numbers. She has worked on several campaigns including Gov. Schwarzenegger's 2006 re-election campaign and the McCain-Palin campaign in 2008.
Tierra joined the CRNC in January 2008 as Deputy Executive Director and oversaw the daily management of the CRNC office. Now she handles high dollar fundraising and hopes to continue the success the CRNC has had in the past.
When she's not politicking, Tierra enjoys shopping, traveling, and small dogs. Tierra graduated from the University of California San Diego in 2008 with a Bachelors degree in political science and is now working on a Masters degree at Johns Hopkins University.
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