44. Andrew Stepanian

Andrew Stepanian, co-founder of Sparrow Media Project, a grassroots publicity and creative direction forum with a subversive touch, is the creative mind galvanizing myriad progressive causes and working tirelessly to amplify messaging for local, regional, and national activist groups. The indefatigable Stepanian serves as a much-needed megaphone for those without a voice, and dedicates his time to helping rally people around important issues, whether it’s the environment, animal rights, Islamophobia, criminal justice, youth imprisonment, government secrecy, whistleblowers, or any number of others that require immediate attention. As the creative director for Balestra Media, Stepanian melds the realms of art and activism, weaponizing his passions and contempt for the unjust to champion such causes as justice for U.S. Army whistleblower Chelsea Manning, for example, who was sentenced to 35 years for leaking hundreds of thousands of U.S. military and State Department records that exposed, among other revelations, the massacres of unarmed civilians and journalists. (President Obama commuted Manning’s sentence before leaving office.) Stepanian has a gift for spreading marginalized groups’ messages across social media akin to igniting a type of digital wildfire, and since President Donald Trump’s election victory, has lent these talents to a number of “resistance” organizations, raising awareness and mobilizing the populace to action against a number of the new commander-in-chief’s controversial policies. Stepanian illuminates the power of the people, and in our book, that’s the most important role someone can play.