Members
Members
Seventeen national civic leaders from the left, center and right of the political spectrum served on the Citizens' Debate Commission.
The seventeen members
The following civic leaders served on the Citizens' Debate Commission. Roles are given as the Commission listed them in 2004.
| Member | Role as listed by the Commission |
|---|---|
| John B. Anderson | Former U.S. Congressman, former presidential candidate, and chair of the Center for Voting and Democracy |
| Angela Bay Buchanan | President of The American Cause and former U.S. Treasurer |
| Veronica De La Garza | Executive director of the Youth Vote Coalition |
| Norman Dean | Executive director of Friends of the Earth and chair of CERES |
| George Farah | Executive director of Open Debates and author of No Debate |
| Tom Fitton | President of Judicial Watch |
| Tom Gerety | Executive director and Brennan Center Professor of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law and former President of Amherst College |
| Jehmu Greene | Executive director of Rock the Vote |
| Alan Keyes | Former GOP presidential candidate, former Ambassador to the United Nations, and chairman of the Declaration Foundation |
| Jeff Milchen | Founder and Executive Director of ReclaimDemocracy.org |
| Larry Noble | Executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics and former general counsel of the Federal Election Commission |
| Tony Perkins | President of the Family Research Council and a former Louisiana state representative |
| Chellie Pingree | President and CEO of Common Cause and former Maine Senate Majority Leader |
| Randall Robinson | Author and founder of TransAfrica Forum |
| Dan Stein | Executive director of the Federation for American Immigration Reform |
| Mark Weisbrot | Co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research |
| Paul Weyrich | Chair and CEO of the Free Congress Foundation and founding president of the Heritage Foundation |
Why the mix mattered
The membership was built to be unmistakably cross-partisan. It paired Common Cause, the Brennan Center, Rock the Vote, Friends of the Earth and the Center for Economic and Policy Research with Judicial Watch, the Family Research Council, the Free Congress Foundation, the Federation for American Immigration Reform and The American Cause. Two former presidential candidates sat on it, John B. Anderson, who ran as an independent in 1980, and Alan Keyes, who sought the Republican nomination in 1996 and 2000, and a former general counsel of the Federal Election Commission, Larry Noble, gave it standing on election law.
At the founding announcement on 12 January 2004, Mark Weisbrot put the point plainly: the issue was of such importance to the health of American democracy that liberals and conservatives were putting aside ideological differences to sponsor truly democratic debates. John B. Anderson said the Commission would sponsor presidential debates that put voter education first.
Editorial note
The roles above are those on the archived members page, which was last updated in 2004 and remained online unchanged until the site lapsed. Many have changed since: Chellie Pingree was elected to Congress from Maine in 2008, Paul Weyrich died in December 2008, John B. Anderson died in December 2017, and several of the named organizations have changed leadership or names. No current affiliation is implied for anyone listed.
Sources
- Members, citizensdebates.org (archived 4 September 2013)
- Press release: Citizens' Debate Commission Formed, 12 January 2004 (archived)
This page was rebuilt from the Commission’s archived website. It is kept for reference; see the home page for what the Commission was.