A complete list of the exceptional leaders we’ve honored. Their distinguished records show them to be stalwart advocates for consumer and worker rights.
2024
Pete Buttigieg, U.S. Secretary of Transportation
Anna Werner, Senior Consumer Investigative Correspondent for CBS News
2023
Kathleen Sebelius, Former Secretary of Health and Human Services
former Governor of Kansas
Rob Bonta, Attorney General of the State of California
2022
Dr. Francis Collins, M.D., Ph.D., National Institutes of Health
Secretary Xavier Becerra, Department of Health and Human Services
2021
Rohit Chopra, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
Governor Gretchen Whitmer
Attorney General Dana Nessel
2020
Vicky Nguyen, NBC News
Jessica Rosenworcel, FCC Commissioner
2019
Sara Nelson, International President of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, AFL-CIO
2018
Senator Tammy Duckworth
Senator Ed Markey
2017
Congressman John Lewis
CFPB Director Richard Cordray
2016
Attorney General Lisa Madigan
2015
The Honorable Edith Ramirez, FTC
Senator Amy Klobuchar
2014
Richard L. Trumka, President AFL-CIO
2013
FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn (pictured at right)
Special honors: Consumer and Labor Leadership Awards to Senators Tom Harkin and Jay Rockefeller
2012
Cecil E. Roberts, United Mine Workers of America
2011
FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg
Randi Weingarten, American Federation of Teachers
2010
Kenneth Feinberg
Surgeon General Regina Benjamin
2009
Steve Kroft
Hilda Solis
2008
Attorney General Richard Blumenthal
Barbara Ehrenreich
2007
Linda Golodner
2006
Senator Paul Sarbanes
Herb Weisbaum
2005
Jane Bryant Quinn
Deborah Kaplan
2004
Morton Bahr
Judy Feder
2003
Senator Jon Corzine
Congressman Tom Lantos
2002
Senator Carl Levin
Michelle Singletary
2001
Linda Chavez-Thompson
Senator Paul Wellstone
2000
Joan Z. (Jodie) Bernstein
Congressman David E. Bonior
Surgeon General Dr. David Satcher
1999
Secretary of Labor Alexis Herman
“Frontline”
1998
Myrlie Evers-Williams
Broad Meadows Middle School, Quincy, MA
1997
Liz Claiborne, Inc.
Carol Tucker Foreman
1996
Secretary of Labor Robert Reich
1995
Minnesota Attorney General Hubert Humphrey III
New York City District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau
Chairman Kailash Satyarthi, South Asian Coalition on Child Servitude
Special Recognition: Meredith M. Layer, former Senior Vice President for Public Responsibility, American Express Company
1994
FDA Commissioner David Kessler
Bert Seidman
1993
Senator Tom Harkin
Dolores Huerta
1992
Senator Jay Rockefeller
Charlayne Hunter-Gault
1991
Dr. Arnold S. Relman
Jack Blum
1990
Congressman Don Pease
Lynn Williams
Special Recognition: Bonnie Guiton
1989
Susan King
Congressman George Miller
1988
Congresswoman Patricia Schroeder
Congressman Peter Rodino
Special Recognition: Susanne Zwemer
1987
Arthur Flemming
Marian Wright Edelman
1986
Congressman Gus Hawkins
Senator Charles Mathias
1985
Betty Furness
Sarah Newman
Congressman Henry Waxman
Qazi Shaukat Fareed
1984
Douglas Fraser
1983
Ig Falk
Special Recognition: Jane Brody, Penny Wise Budoff, Rose Kushner, Fitzhugh Mullan, Natalie Spingarn
1982
Congressman Claude Pepper
1981
Esther Peterson
1980
Lady Bird Johnson (posthumously for President Johnson)
W. Averell Harriman
1979
Jacob Clayman
Robert Nathan
1978
Senator Harrison A. Williams
Caroline Ware
1977
Senator Warren Magnuson
Evelyn Dubrow
1976
Senator Philip A. Hart
Congresswoman Leonor K. Sullivan
Maida Springer Kemp
1975
Senator Alan Cranston
Senator Charles Percy
Special Recognition: Clara Beyer, Edith Sloan, Virginia Knauer, Bess Myerson
1973
Senator Edward Kennedy