2024 Raj Soin College of Business Outstanding Alumna

Danielle Rolfes is the partner-in-charge of KPMG’s Washington National Tax practice, which comprises 82 partners and 184 senior professionals to form the technical core of KPMG’s U.S. tax practice. She is also KPMG’s tax policy lead for the Americas and a trusted advisor to key clients, including Amazon, Apple, Citibank and Meta.

From 2011 to 2017, Rolfes served as the international tax counsel at the U.S. Treasury Department, where she was the principal legal adviser on cross-border tax issues and led the Office of the International Tax Counsel, a team of attorneys who provide advice and analysis on international tax issues, including legislation, regulations and tax treaties. She also represented the United States on key tax policy issues at the Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development. Before joining the Treasury Department, she was a partner in a law firm, where she advised multinational corporations on international tax planning and controversy matters.

A 1997 summa cum laude graduate from Wright State’s College of Business, she also holds an LL.M. in taxation, with distinction, from Georgetown and a juris doctor from Harvard Law School, where she graduated magna cum laude and was an editor of the Harvard Law Review.

Danielle Rolfes ’97

Although Rolfes knew she eventually wanted to go to law school, her mother, also a Wright State alumna, encouraged her to get an accounting degree as a first step, to learn “the language of business” and ensure employment before law school. That good advice and Wright State’s top-notch accounting program paved the way for her to spend two years as an accountant at Procter & Gamble before matriculating to Harvard in 1999.

Rolfes is grateful for the support Wright State provided her through several scholarships. She was raised by a single mom whose financial support for college was limited to providing a roof over her head, though her mother was an invaluable supporter and cheerleader and had attended Wright State. After her divorce, her mother made the brave choice to return to Wright State to complete her undergraduate degree and later her MBA.

In honor of her mother, who passed in 2009, Rolfes endowed the Rolfes Family Scholarship to support single parents who, like her, bravely pursue a degree from Wright State’s Raj Soin College of Business to provide a better life for their children.

Rolfes has served on the Wright State Foundation Board since 2017. She is proudest, though, of the magic of her two children, Henry (9) and Lily (7).