Editor’s Note: McKnight’s Long-Term Care News, McKnight’s Home Care and McKnight’s Senior Living are profiling the McKnight’s 2024 Pinnacle Awards honorees daily in April and May. For additional McKnight’s Pinnacle Awards content, visit this page.

It would be impossible to list all of the legislative wins Clif Porter II has achieved throughout his career. 

As the chief lobbyist for the American Health Care Association/National Center for Assisted Living, he is at the table when national regulators, policymakers and elected officials scrutinize long-term care. He also offers his expertise to AHCA/NCAL members wrangling with state issues. 

He has held his post with the group for almost a decade and is credited with revitalizing the association’s grassroots and advocacy efforts to ensure federal regulators hear directly from sector employees through comments on proposed federal rules. His achievements include aiding passage of the IMPACT Act, repealing the physician sustainable growth rate, furthering skilled nursing facility value-based purchasing, and the permanent repeal of the Medicare Part B therapy caps. 

He also was a leading voice on Capitol Hill in negotiations during the COVID-19 response to secure essential financial support and flexibility for the long-term care sector. He continues to push policymakers to see the harm that a federal minimum staffing requirement would cause to nursing homes.

Porter began his 34-year tenure in long-term care as a nursing home volunteer and went on to earn his bachelor’s degree in healthcare management at Virginia Commonwealth University. 

He worked first as an administrator at 34-bed Brookwood Nursing Home in Stafford, VA, and Medical Facilities of America in Richmond, VA, before moving to HCR ManorCare, where he ascended the ranks from administrator to regional director of operations to vice president of government relations. 

  • Holds an MBA from Florida State University.
  • Earned a bachelor’s degree in healthcare management from the VCU School of Medicine. 
  • Along with his wife, Deborah, established the Porter Legacy Scholarship to support diversity, equity and inclusion efforts for students pursuing bachelor’s degrees in health services at Virginia Commonwealth University’s College of Health Professions. 

The McKnight’s Pinnacle Awards program is jointly administered by McKnight’s Long-Term Care News, McKnight’s Senior Living and McKnight’s Home Care. Honorees were recognized March 21 at a dinner and awards ceremony in Chicago. Omnicare was the Silver sponsor for the 2024 Pinnacle Awards program. Parker Health Group and Sentrics were event sponsors.