Our word is gold.
We offer full-service general political consulting, strategic public affairs advisory, campaign management, and we partner with top-tier media, digital, mail, communications, and polling firms to provide comprehensive media consulting for Democratic and progressive leaders, campaigns, and causes.
Whether it's a short-term campaign sprint or multi-cycle public affairs strategy, we bring honesty, structure, and the systems that win today and build power for the future.
About Us
Shwetika Baijal and Erica Kwiatkowski Nielsen founded Golden Campaigns to help Democratic and progressive leaders, campaigns, and causes see their destination, build the road to it, and guide the team in execution every step of the way.
We offer full-service general consulting and campaign management, and we partner with top-tier media, mail, and polling firms to provide comprehensive media consulting. Our complementary but different experiences, skills, networks, and perspectives mean any project is handled with multi-faceted care. Some clients we work with together, others independently, but always with the shared learning and mutual support we've cultivated over a decade as advocates, friends, and collaborators.
We make sure all aspects of your campaign are doing what they're supposed to, when they're supposed to, integrating with each other, and driving toward the win. Our approach combines rigorous structure with creative problem-solving. Building the discipline to hit immediate goals while staying nimble enough to seize opportunities as they emerge.
Services Offered
Creating order from chaos today. Building power for tomorrow.
Campaign Management & Consulting
- General Consulting: Guide c3, c4, candidate, ballot initiative, independent expenditure, and other public affairs campaigns in all elements of campaign strategy, infrastructure, operational guidance, budgeting and financial planning, message and communications strategy, and consultant and vendor coordination.
- Full-Service Campaign Management: On select projects, we step into the campaign management role from pre-launch set up to post-campaign debriefs and everything in between.
- Strategic Planning and Advisory: Advise on the strategy, planning, and implementation of campaign plans. Produce landscape analysis with programmatic detail, develop campaign tactics and strategies, recommended pacing and operational timelines, outline operational needs related to staffing, vendors, and workflows and translate leadership priorities into actionable campaign materials.
- Candidate Campaigns: From full service General Consulting to Senior Advising roles, we guide the principal and campaign staff providing high-level advisory support to align messaging, operations, and political objectives. We lead on positioning, decision-making, and navigating the political landscape to help your campaign's leadership capitalize on opportunities to win.
- Independent Expenditure Management & Strategy: Execute high-impact independent expenditure programs across all levels of the ballot in coordination with IE-side partners to optimize resources.
- Ballot Initiative Management and Advising: Lead teams and orchestrate diverse stakeholders to pass consequential policy on the ballot.
- Comprehensive Media Consulting: Build and execute comprehensive paid communications strategies across mediums to ensure the right audiences hear the right messages at the right time. Focus on finding the right match between resources available and the audiences we need to target and talk to.
Public Affairs Strategy
- Multi-Cycle Strategic Planning: Design long-term roadmaps to build lasting power and achieve ambitious policy goals. Build connective tissue across electoral, judicial, legislative, grasstops, power building, and other kinds of public affairs strategy.
- Scenario Planning: Build nimble strategies that allow campaigns to pivot and seize emerging opportunities.
- Political Analysis & Power Mapping: Evaluate complex political landscapes and identify key stakeholders, opportunities, and challenges.
- Multi-Entity Program Strategy: Develop and guide public affairs programs for groups with multiple entities to maximize impact while ensuring compliance.
Organizational Advising
- Management & Advising of Principals: Serve as trusted counselors to high-profile candidates and organizational leaders.
- Coaching & Talent Development: Cultivate the next generation of political operatives and senior campaign staff.
- Organizational Structure & Leadership: Translate big ideals into functional systems and disciplined operational environments.
- Thought Leadership Positioning: Craft clear points of view that elevate leaders within the progressive ecosystem.
Our team
Shwetika Baijal | Founding Partner
Shwetika built her 13+ years of experience running campaigns across electoral, judicial, legislative, and power-building strategies in 24 states and counting. She's known for her perseverance and her foundation in moving teams forward to outcomes, whether managing multi million-dollar programs or building unlikely coalitions.
Most recently, Shwetika served as Senior Director of Elections and Accountability at Planned Parenthood's national Federation of America (c3), Action Fund (c4), and Votes (SuperPAC) from 2020-2025. In that role, she led electoral and independent expenditure strategy overseeing multi-state, multi-tactic campaigns ranging from $250k to $50 million across all levels of the ballot. Following the Dobbs decision, Shwetika managed the strategic pivot that established abortion access as a dominant electoral message nationwide. She also co-managed an 11-person team managing a 50-state public affairs portfolio - navigating the operational complexities of c3, c4, and SuperPAC structures while executing concurrent legislative, electoral, and judicial campaigns. Washingtonian Magazine recognized her in their 2023 Washington DC's 500 Most Influential People" for this work.
Prior to joining Planned Parenthood's national office, Shwetika served in New Hampshire on Senator Cory Booker's 2020 presidential campaign. From 2015-2019, she was Vice President at 50+1 Strategies, where she worked across federal advocacy, electoral campaigns, and grassroots organizing with 32 clients. Her signature project was a multi-cycle ballot initiative to restore arts funding where she negotiated with 30+ coalition leaders, from opera executives to independent artists struggling to survive in San Francisco, and secured $80 million with unanimous support. The measure won with 73%. She also led the ACLU of Northern California's first c4 campaign of $2.5mn in direct voter contact and paid media, and helped coordinate the 2018 San Francisco March for Our Lives.
Shwetika's career started in finance, tech, and film festivals - experiences that shaped her belief in rigorous structure paired with creative problem-solving. She holds a B.A. from Boston University, where she designed her own interdisciplinary major. She lives in Washington, D.C. with her sister, parents, and dog. She's in her fifth year of learning to swim, loves to watch movies in theaters, and has made a permanent return to writing with fountain pens.
Erica Kwiatkowski Nielsen | Founding Partner
Erica is a seasoned political strategist with nearly 15 years of experience winning tough campaigns, shaping $1 billion+ in paid media strategy, and advising high-profile candidates and organizations across the country.
Throughout her career, Erica has worked on campaigns up and down the ballot, from presidential races to competitive congressional districts, statewide offices, and high-stakes ballot initiatives. Most recently, she served as a Partner at Bearstar Strategies, where she played a key role in some of California's most consequential political fights. Erica helped lead the paid media campaign to defeat the 2021 Republican-led recall of Governor Gavin Newsom and supported his decisive 2022 re-election victory. Additionally, she helped elect Malia Cohen as California State Controller and contributed to a range of successful ballot initiatives, congressional races, and state legislative campaigns in 2022 and 2024.
Erica was also a co-founder of an innovative, screen-agnostic media buying firm that designs integrated media strategies to reach voters wherever they are during her tenure at Bearstar.
Before joining Bearstar, Erica served at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), where she advised some of the most competitive frontline and challenger campaigns in the country—from Maine to Arizona—helping Democrats protect their House majority in the 2020 election cycle. Prior to this, she helped lead the early states team on Vice President Kamala Harris's first presidential campaign.
Erica was recognized as a "Rising Star" by Orange Coast Magazine for her role in managing Congresswoman Katie Porter's historic 2018 victory. In that race, Erica helped flip California's 45th Congressional District from red to blue for the first time in history—winning by more than four points and driving record turnout after advancing through a crowded six-way jungle primary.
Earlier in her career, Erica directed multi-million-dollar paid media programs and advised candidates, independent expenditures, and ballot measure campaigns across the country—developing the strategic messaging and media operations that powered winning campaigns.
Erica graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. in Political Science from the University of California, Santa Barbara. She lives in Southern California with her husband and three children.
Hannah Hargis | Executive Coordinator
Hannah Hargis is the Executive Coordinator at Golden Campaigns, where she supports the partners and drives operational strategy across the organization. Prior to joining Golden Campaigns, her work focused on advancing criminal justice reform policy initiatives.
Hannah began her career as a paralegal with the Wisconsin State Public Defender, where she became familiar with the legal system. She later served as a Program Associate of Policy & Research for a nonprofit advancing criminal justice reform, supporting policy initiatives and high-level operations, including convenings for a nationwide network of elected prosecutors. She holds a degree in Sociology with a minor in Legal Studies. While earning her degree, she volunteered with Wisconsin Conservation Voters, helping advance environmental advocacy and civic engagement efforts across Wisconsin.
In her free time, Hannah enjoys reading, practicing yoga, and traveling. She earned her yoga teaching certification through the Prison Yoga Project and serves as a fundraising ambassador for an environmental nonprofit supporting remote communities in Indonesia.