Roxanne Brown

International Vice President at Large

Roxanne Brown is the USW’s International Vice President at Large, overseeing the union’s public policy and legislative agenda as well as its political work. She has spent more than two decades advancing policies on Capitol Hill and with regulatory agencies on behalf of USW members. She has extensive experience in manufacturing, environmental and energy policy. 

Brown has testified on workers’ behalf before the International Trade Commission, on Capitol Hill and before state legislatures, and she has represented the USW with global policymakers, including the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change. 

She helped advance legislation to strengthen U.S. defense procurement laws, ensuring that tens of thousands of USW members—including the combat vehicle manufacturers at Local 7687 (York, Pa.) and the shipbuilders at Local 8888 (Newport News, Va.)—continue to arm and equip America’s military.

Brown plays a key role in shaping environmental policies with the potential to affect USW jobs. She led the USW’s work on the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, helping to avert unintended negative consequences on workers. Although the legislation stalled in Congress, the provisions she helped to develop became a model for job and manufacturing retention in climate measures.

In 2002, Brown helped coordinate a 20,000-person rally in Washington, D.C., calling on President George W. Bush to protect the steel industry from foreign dumping.

Brown serves as a vice president on the AFL-CIO Executive Council and was a founding steering committee member of the BlueGreen Alliance.

She is a member of the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists and serves on the boards of the Center for Community Change, the League of Conservation Voters and the National Endowment for Democracy.  In 2023, TIME magazine recognized Brown as one of the 100 most innovative leaders driving climate action.   

Born in Kingston, Jamaica, Brown was raised in White Plains, N.Y.