Organizational Members
The Competitive Enterprise Institute is a non-profit public policy organization dedicated to advancing the principles of limited government, free enterprise, and individual liberty. Our mission is to promote both freedom and fairness by making good policy good politics. We make the uncompromising case for economic freedom because we believe it is essential for entrepreneurship, innovation, and prosperity to flourish. Unique among free market groups, CEI pursues a full-service approach to advancing public policy. We publish original scholarly studies that make the case for an issue, but our work doesn’t end there. We then take it to the next level by marketing our policy proposals. We craft and deploy media advocacy campaigns around that foundation of solid research in order to reach policy makers, influential opinion leaders, and grassroots activists. CEI policy analysts produce timely commentaries for major news organizations, appear on television and radio, and reach out to beat reporters covering our issues. Founded in 1984, CEI has grown into an effective advocate for freedom on a wide range of critical policy issues, including energy, environment, business and finance, technology, telecommunications, and food and drug regulation.
Citizens Against Government Waste is a private, non-partisan, non-profit organization representing more than one million members and supporters nationwide. CAGW’s mission is to eliminate waste, mismanagement, and inefficiency in the federal government. Founded in 1984 by the late industrialist J. Peter Grace and syndicated columnist Jack Anderson, CAGW is the legacy of the President’s Private Sector Survey on Cost Control, also known as the Grace Commission. CAGW’s membership has grown from 5,000 members in February 1988 to more than one million members and supporters today. This phenomenal growth is the result of taxpayers’ increasing frustration with the squandering of their hard-earned money in the nation’s capital. CAGW is nationally recognized as the source of information on government waste. CAGW representatives appear frequently on television, radio talk shows, and in print. CAGW produces numerous publications highlighting wasteful government spending. Government WasteWatch is the group’s quarterly newspaper, which is distributed to members of CAGW, Congress, and members of the media nationwide. The annual Congressional Pig Book Summary is CAGW’s famous exposé of the most glaring and irresponsible pork-barrel projects in the 13 annual appropriations bills and their sponsors.
TechFreedom is a non-profit, non-partisan technology policy think tank launched in 2011. Our mission is to promote the progress of technology that improves the human condition and expands individual capacity to choose. We advance the freedoms that make experimentation, entrepreneurship and investment possible, and thus unleash the ultimate resource: human ingenuity. On a wide variety of issues, TechFreedom will outline a path forward for policymakers towards a bright future where technology enhances freedom and freedom enhances technology. TechFreedom has four specific goals: (1) to make the case for pragmatic optimism by highlighting the benefits of technological change and bottom-up, market-based solutions to concerns raised by change; (2) to highlight the costs to consumers of regulatory intervention; (3) to develop and defend the least restrictive means for government to remedy real harms—focusing on increased education, innovation in consumer empowerment tools, and better enforcement of existing laws; (4) to facilitate constructive, serious dialogue on technology policy through regular events.
Individual Members
The Honorable Robert S. Walker, Chairman of Wexler & Walker Public Policy Associates, retired from service in the U.S. House of Representatives after 20 years representing Pennsylvania’s 16th District. During that time he was Chairman of the Committee on Science and Technology, Chief Deputy Whip, Vice Chairman of the Budget Committee, Chairman of the Republican Leadership and Speaker Pro Tempore. Mr. Walker’s expertise in aerospace issues is recognized and utilized. In 2001, he was appointed to chair the Commission on the Future of the U.S. Aerospace Industry. In 2004, he served on the President’s Commission on Implementation of the U.S. Space Exploration Policy. For several years Congressman Walker was a member of the Aeronautics and Space Engineering Board of the National Research Council. In 1996 he was the first sitting House Member to be awarded NASA’s highest honor, the Distinguished Service Medal and in 2004 received the NASA Distinguished Public Services Medal. Today he is on the boards of the Aerospace Corporation, Space Adventures and SpaceDev. From 2006 – 2008, he was Chairman of the Space Foundation and is presently a Director Emeritus of that board.
Edward L. Hudgins, Director of Advocacy and Senior Scholar at The Atlas Society, is an expert on the regulation of space and transportation, pharmaceuticals, and labor. He served as a senior economist for the Joint Economic Committee of the U.S. Congress and was both deputy director for economic policy studies and director of the Center for International Economic Growth at the Heritage Foundation. He has testified on many occasions before Congress. His opinion writing has been published in the Wall Street Journal, Houston Chronicle, USA Today, Philadelphia Inquirer, Journal of Commerce, and Aviation Week & Space Technology. He is the editor of Freedom to Trade: Refuting the New Protectionism, Space: The Free Market Frontier and two books on postal service privatization. His latest collection is entitled An Objectivist Secular Reader. He has  appeared on NBC’s “Dateline NBC,” National Public Radio, PBS, Fox News Channel, CNN, MSNBC and Voice of America. Mr. Hudgins has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Maryland, a master’s from American University, and a doctorate from Catholic University in political philosophy. He has taught at universities in the United States and in Germany. Mr. Hudgins formerly served as director of regulatory studies for the Cato Institute and editor of Regulation Magazine.
Andrew Langer, President of the Institute for Liberty, is a long-time fighter for small business. Mr. Langer came to IFL from the National Federation of Independent Business, where he headed that organization’s regulatory practice for six years. Mr. Langer focuses on the incremental threats to small business and entrepreneurship, helping policymakers understand why small businesses are different than big businesses, how the regulatory state impacts those small businesses, and what government can do to best help small businesses. He is responsible for protecting the interests of small business in the face of an ever-increasing burden from regulatory agencies, as well the protection of the private property rights of small business owners. A dynamic and energetic speaker, Mr. Langer has testified before Congress nearly twenty times, has offered advice to state governments, and is routinely asked by foreign governments to consult on making improvements to their small business sectors. Mr. Langer attended the College of William and Mary in Virginia, where he received a BA in International Relations. He also holds a Masters in Public Administration from Troy State University.
James A. M. Muncy, Founder of PoliSpace, an independent space policy consultancy, is a well-known expert on space policy, NASA spaceflight programs, and the commercial space industry. In 2004 and 2005 Mr. Muncy was instrumental in the passage of the Commercial Space Launch Amendments Act of 2004 (P.L 108-492). From 1997 through early 2000 Mr. Muncy served on the Professional Staff of the House Science Committee’s Space and Aeronautics Subcommittee. As Chairman Dana Rohrabacher’s staff designee, Mr. Muncy held the lead responsibility for issues and programs such as reusable launch vehicles, human space flight commercialization, military space technology, and future NASA programs. Prior to his service on Capitol Hill, Mr. Muncy spent nine years as a space policy and marketing consultant for various clients including NASA, NOAA, several private firms, and the not-for-profit space community. He also served as a policy assistant in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy under President Reagan, where he served as the White House’s Staff Liaison to the National Commission on Space. Mr. Muncy began his career in space policy in 1981 as a staff advisor in the Office of Congressman Newt Gingrich, where he helped Mr. Gingrich co-found the Congressional Space Caucus and develop visionary space policy legislation and initiatives. Mr. Muncy co-founded the Space Frontier Foundation in 1988 and served as its Chairman of the Board for six years. Earlier he had served on the Board of Directors of both the National Space Society and the L5 Society. Mr. Muncy holds an MS in Space Studies from the Center for Aerospace Sciences at the University of North Dakota and a BA from the University of Virginia.
Robert Poole, Director of Transportation Policy and the Searle Freedom Trust  Transportation Fellow at the Reason Foundation, is an expert on aviation policy. In  aviation security, Mr. Poole advised the White House and House Republican leaders on what became the Aviation & Transportation Security Act of 2001, enacted in response to the 9/11 attacks. He has authored a number of Reason policy studies on aviation security and is the author of a paper on risk-based aviation security for the OECD’s International  Transport Forum. Mr. Poole was among the first to propose the commercialization of the U.S. air traffic control system, and his work in this field has helped shape proposals for a U.S. ATC corporation. A version of his corporation concept was implemented in Canada in 1996. He has advised the Office of the Secretary of Transportation, the White House Office of Policy Development, the National Performance Review, the National Economic Council, and the National Civil Aviation Review Commission on ATC commercialization. He is a member of the Air Traffic Control Association and of the GAO’s National Aviation Studies Advisory Panel. Mr. Poole edits monthly Reason Foundation e-newsletters on airport and air traffic control policy issues. He received his B.S. and M.S. in mechanical engineering at MIT and did graduate work in operations research at New York University.
Thomas A. Schatz, President of Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) and its lobbying affiliate, the Council for Citizens Against Government Waste (CCAGW), is a nationally-recognized spokesperson on government waste and has been interviewed on hundreds of radio talk shows from coast to coast. He appears regularly on national television news programs and local news broadcasts. His appearances include ABC’s “Good Morning America,” CBS’s “60 Minutes,” Fox News Channel’s “The O’Reilly Factor,” NBC’s “Nightly News,” and PBS’s “The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer.” He is also a regularly featured guest on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” during their popular “Pork Watch” segment. His editorials on fiscal policy have appeared in publications nationwide, including The Wall Street Journal and The Chicago Sun-Times. Mr. Schatz has testified numerous times on government waste issues before committees of the United States Senate and House of Representatives, as well as before state and local legislative and regulatory bodies. Prior to joining CAGW in 1986, Mr. Schatz spent six years as legislative director for Congressman Hamilton Fish and two years practicing law and lobbying. Mr. Schatz holds a law degree from George Washington University and a BA in Political Science from the State University of New York at Binghamton.
Rand Simberg, Adjunct Scholar at Competitive Enterprise Institute and Chairman, Competitive Space Task Force, is an expert on space technology and policy, particularly with regard to NASA and commercial human spaceflight. He has published lengthy essays on these topics at The New Atlantis, and contributed many columns for Fox News, Popular Mechanics, AOL News, and Pajamas Media. With over three decades of experience, including many years in aerospace engineering and project management at the Aerospace Corporation and Rockwell International Corporation in Los Angeles, he has been recognized as an expert in space transportation by the Office of Technology Assessment. Mr. Simberg has also consulted to space businesses, from startups to major corporations, on space systems engineering, business planning, and business development, including Kelly Space and Technology, the Boeing Corporation, ARES, XCOR Aerospace, Masten Space Technologies, and others. He is the former editor of The Space Activist’s Handbook, and served as a technical editor for many proposals and technical reports. Mr. Simberg  holds multiple engineering degrees from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, and an MSE in technical management from West Coast University in Los Angeles.