Dr. Trudi M. Morrison with Simone Ross — Winning the Battle Against Myself
The first Black COO of the U.S. Senate discusses her memoir on navigating all three branches of American government under four presidential administrations.
Why we picked this
Morrison served in all three branches of the federal government at senior levels — a vantage most Americans will never have, rendered here with the candor that public service rarely produces while it's happening.
Trudi M. Morrison’s career cuts across American government in a way that is genuinely unusual. She worked in top posts in all three branches — including as the first Black COO of the U.S. Senate — and was commended by four presidents spanning both parties. Winning the Battle Against Myself: A Black Woman’s Journey Through America’s Corridors of Power is her account of that career: what the corridors actually looked like, who was in them, what it cost to navigate them as a Black woman in an era that made that navigation necessary.
The conversation is in partnership with Simone Ross, who became the first person of color to lead the Colorado Women’s Chamber of Commerce, and brings a Colorado dimension to questions about power, representation, and the gap between institutional ideals and institutional reality.
The Aspen Grove location in Littleton is a slightly more suburban venue than the Colfax flagship, but the conversation it’s hosting is anything but provincial.