Donna Rice Hughes (born January 7, 1958) is an American activist, author, speaker and film producer who is president and chairperson of Enough Is Enough.
[1][2] She first became known as a key figure in a widely publicized 1987 political scandal that contributed to the end of the second campaign of former Senator Gary Hart for the Democratic Party nomination for president.
She attended Irmo High School[citation needed] and the University of South Carolina, where she was a cheerleader and a member of the Phi Beta Kappa honor society.
[4] Rice later moved to Miami, where she worked as a marketing representative for pharmaceutical giant Wyeth Laboratories in South Florida.
[3] Rice met former Senator Gary Hart at a 1986–87 New Year's Eve Party at the Aspen, Colorado, home of her then boyfriend, rocker Don Henley.
Having enjoyed a surprisingly strong campaign in 1984 against the eventual nominee, former vice president Walter Mondale, he was widely perceived as a front-runner for the Democratic nomination in 1988.
Shortly thereafter, rumors began circulating that he was a "womanizer", leading Hart to invite the media to observe his public behavior and to claim that anybody who did so would "be very bored.
[9][12] Hart's popular appeal suffered, and polls taken almost immediately afterward found him 10 points behind Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis in New Hampshire.
[15] On the cover of its June 2, 1987 edition,[16] the celebrity tabloid National Enquirer published a photograph of Rice sitting on Hart's lap.
The enormous publicity generated by the Hart scandal resulted in numerous lucrative offers, and while Rice refused most – including one for an interview with Playboy magazine, an ABC movie of the week, book and magazine offers – she did appear in 1987 as the No Excuses jeans girl in commercials and advertisements for No Excuses jeans.
Beyond addressing the dangers of Internet pornography, Hughes has also spoken into the issue of privacy online, teen suicide and the impact of cyberbullying.
[46] As a platform issue of Enough Is Enough,[47] she has written and spoken regularly on the harms of online bullying, the relational brokenness of young people,[48] and the need for a safer, kinder and ethical community on and offline.
[50] She has also written numerous commentaries that have been published in the Los Angeles Times, USA Today, Politico, CNN, FOX News and other media outlets.
[24] She has said she was a victim of date rape "on the way to New York City by an older man who was involved with the pageant system, and lost my virginity at that time".