I wrote a book on lobbying. Literally.
But “Choosing the Hero” isn’t a dry-as-dust manual; it is a narrative account of how strategic advocacy helped propel Ellen Johnson Sirleaf to become the first woman democratically elected to lead an African nation.
Since the memoir’s publication a decade ago, the political landscape has shifted beneath our feet. But revisiting these lessons in the Trump 2.0 era reveals a surprising, even comforting, reality: While every traditional assumption of the lobbying trade has been turned on its head, the core truisms of exerting influence remain stubbornly intact.
In a town obsessed with power, the only permanent currency is credibility. A good lobbyist isn’t a salesman; they are a highly specialized research librarian—a cartographer of political timing. Below are my three truisms, and how that currency has—and continues to be—spent in the trenches.
Leverage the Friction
Truism: In DC, policy is rarely a straight line, and Washington almost never speaks with one voice. If you can’t move a reluctant administration, you must find the caucus that believes in the cause—and use their voices to change the narrative on the ground.
In 2005, the George W. Bush administration was paralyzed by a self-imposed neutrality. Despite the desperate need for a reformer, State Department officials refused to back any single candidate in the Liberian presidential election—even one as uniquely qualified as Sirleaf. They chose the safety of the sidelines.
We didn’t waste time trying to break the deadlock. Instead, we went to the other side of the aisle.
By engaging congressional leaders on both sides of the aisle, we built a groundswell of momentum that bypassed the executive branch entirely. Crucially, we understood that in advocacy, perception is often more powerful than reality. We fashioned public statements and floor speeches that, while technically independent of the administration, were read as resounding US endorsements in the Liberian media.
This created an echo effect that bolstered Sirleaf’s stature at home and eventually forced the Bush administration to turn a perceived endorsement into a literal one.
2026 Reality: We see this same pincer movement in today’s global trade battles. With the White House “front door” locked by ideological litmus tests, advocates are activating bipartisan caucuses to pass legislative vehicles such as H.J. Res. 72. Designed to provide relief for industries crippled by 25% Canadian tariffs, the resolution’s passage, while never believing it could withstand a presidential veto, was a decisive shot across the bow.
This legislative momentum—which had the support of nearly all Democrats and a handful of Republicans in the House—signaled to markets that the tariffs were no longer a permanent fixture. Once investors priced in a reversal, the administration’s leverage as a bargaining chip vanished. This market pressure forced a strategic retreat in February, with the White House lifting the emergency order and granting exemptions for critical minerals—effectively winning the war without ever needing to override the president’s pen.
Narrative of Inevitability
Truism: Nobody wants to be the last person to back a winner. In lobbying, inevitability can be a self-fulfilling prophecy. You don’t just sell a policy; you sell the confidence that the goal is achievable, and you compel others to get on the winning side.
The breakthrough for Sirleaf didn’t happen because we won a moral argument. It happened when we shifted the focus to the probability of victory. We stopped arguing she was “right” and started proving she was winning. This was accomplished by conducting the first polling in the country’s history. That data revealed a truth the DC establishment couldn’t ignore: The majority sentiment in Liberia was no longer fear, but hope.
Once DC sensed her momentum, support followed.
2026 Reality: Look no further than the recent expansion of the US International Development Finance Corporation. In a fiscal environment defined by austerity—where legacy institutions were being discarded—the DFC successfully secured a staggering $205 billion investment cap for fiscal year 2026. This was achieved by pivoting the narrative from “foreign aid” to “national security,” framing the DFC as the only viable American answer to challenge China’s economic dominance.
Once both sides of the aisle believed that commercial diplomacy was the only way to “win the century,” the massive authorization plus-up became a bipartisan foregone conclusion.
By selling the DFC as an essential tool for victory rather than an expense to be managed, the funding followed the narrative.
Challenge the Data
Truism: The most effective advocacy happens upstream. To change the outcome, you must change the data points that decision-makers rely on before they even sit down to write.
When we were told that Sirleaf wasn’t “viable,” we didn’t just disagree with the conclusion; we went to the CIA. We challenged the underlying “bad intelligence” that informed the DC consensus. We didn’t ask for a favor; we corrected a flawed map by delivering fresh, ground-level data to the doorsteps of the intelligence community.
Because we were a known, reliable source, they accepted the shift in “intel” on her viability, changing the policy assumptions before they were set in stone.
2026 Reality: This masterclass played out recently in the Washington Accords between the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda.
For decades, conventional wisdom treated the conflict in eastern Congo as an intractable ethnic war—a narrative that led to decades of diplomatic paralysis. Modern advocacy flipped the script by proving the conflict was fundamentally a mineral supply chain failure.
By replacing the “tribal war” data point with a “critical minerals security” data point, advocates unlocked a US-brokered peace deal in December 2025. They didn’t lobby for peace in the abstract; they lobbied for the stability required to secure the cobalt and copper the world’s energy transition demands. By changing the data upstream, they made a “hopeless” conflict solvable.
In an era of rapid-fire disruption, your ability to provide a “correct map” to a decision-maker is only as good as their trust in the cartographer. You can find the lever, you can project the win, and you can challenge the intelligence—but those tactics only hold weight if you have the reliability to back them up when the stakes are highest. I am reminded that while the tools of our trade evolve, the human demand for a credible partner is permanent.
This article does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg Industry Group, Inc., the publisher of Bloomberg Law, Bloomberg Tax, and Bloomberg Government, or its owners.
Author Information
K. Riva Levinson is the President & CEO of KRL International, a strategic advisory firm focused on emerging markets. She is the author of “Choosing the Hero: My Improbable Journey and the Rise of Africa’s First Woman President.”
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