Michael Waldman
- : Michael Waldman is the executive director of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, a public policy institute and advocacy group that focuses on democracy and justice.
He was Director of Speechwriting for President Bill Clinton from 1995-99, serving as Assistant to the President. He was responsible for writing or editing nearly 2,000 speeches, including four State of the Union speeches and two Inaugural Addresses. Previously, he was Special Assistant to the President for Policy Coordination (1993-95). Mr. Waldman was the top administration policy aide working on campaign finance reform, one of the Center's signature issues, and drafted the administration's public financing proposal.
He is the author of several books, including My Fellow Americans: The Most Important Speeches of American Presidents (Sourcebooks, 2003); POTUS Speaks: Finding the Words that Defined the Clinton Presidency (Simon & Schuster, 2000); Who Robbed America? A Citizens' Guide to the Savings and Loan Scandal (Random House, 1990); and Who Runs Congress? (4th ed., 1984) (coauthored with Mark Green).
Prior to his government service, Mr. Waldman was the director of Public Citizen's Congress Watch, then the capital's largest consumer lobbying office. After leaving the White House, he was a Lecturer in Public Policy at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government (2001-03), teaching courses on political reform, public leadership and communications, and was a litigator in private practice in New York. He is a graduate of Columbia College ('82) and NYU School of Law ('87).
Voting on Voting
Seven years after Florida's hanging chad debacle, three years after voting irregularities in Ohio, and six months after 18,000 votes disappeared in a House race in Sarasota, Congress is finally moving to fix the country's electronic voting systems. Rep. Rush...more »
Posted on May 16, 2007 2:01 PM
The Reform Case FOR Money in Politics
Mark Schmitt’s thoughtful and provocative article has spurred a very welcome conversation among those of us who think that fixing the democracy has to be one of the progressive movement’s big goals. The goal can’t be to end the role...more »
Posted on March 16, 2007 10:46 AM
