{"id":264632,"date":"2026-08-13T15:12:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-13T15:12:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/264632\/"},"modified":"2026-08-13T15:12:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-13T15:12:08","slug":"recap-what-we-saw-at-the-promise-of-democracy-250th-summit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/264632\/","title":{"rendered":"RECAP: What We Saw at the Promise of Democracy 250th Summit"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This July, just about 10 days after the country \u2014 and Philadelphia \u2014 celebrated the semiquincentennial of the Declaration of Independence, good governance nonprofit Committee of 70 welcomed hundreds of U.S. democracy fans to the sold-out Promise of Democracy 250th Summit<\/a>, for which The Citizen was a partner. C70 President and CEO Lauren Cristella described the two-day event as exploring \u201cthe reason for the season.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

In other words, she said: \u201cGet you thinking, or help you learn something, or inspire some new action to take for your community.\u201d<\/p>\n

Democracy-wise, the Summit offered something for everyone \u2014 at a critical moment in our democracy. Said Justin Villere, C70\u2019s VP of Strategy and Partnerships, \u201cThere has never been a more appropriate time for our country to bring together leaders, people committed to public service, scholars, and voters: all serious about doing the work to realize the ideals of the nation\u2019s founding.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pulitzer Prize-winning author John Meacham provided the keynote, a historical summary of the current moment in an address at the National Constitution Center that you quite literally had to be there to experience. The Summit\u2019s second day consisted of five spirited, thoughtful panels and a closing keynote from two of the country\u2019s most esteemed political thinkers at Houston Hall at the University of Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n

Below, videos of each session, also available on C70\u2019s YouTube channel.<\/a> 1. Guardrails of Democracy: Defending the Rule of Law <\/p>\n

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Kermit Roosevelt, Professor for the Administration of Justice at the Penn Carey Law School moderated a discussion about how legal institutions hold up under political pressure, and how recent events shape the public\u2019s understanding of Constitutional norms. Panelists included: Mary Smith, American Bar Association former president; Task Force for American Democracy; Judge John Jones III, former U.S. District Court judge and current president of Dickinson College; Jeh Johnson, Former U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security and co-chair of the Board of Trustees at Columbia University; and David Becker, Executive Director & Founder, Center for Election Innovation & Research.<\/p>\n

\"\"Audience members ask questions at Committee of Seventy\u2019s Promise of Democracy 250th Summit. 2. The Information Crisis: Media, Trust, and Democracy <\/p>\n

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Errin Haines, Editor-at-Large for The 19th, guided the discussion about complexities of today\u2019s information environment, which seems to take advantage of the ease of spreading misinformation and still-eroding trust in the media. How can news organizations cultivate healthier ecosystems? Panelists included: Kathleen Hall Jamieson, Director of Penn Annenberg Public Policy Center and creator of Factcheck.org<\/a>; Ren\u00e9e DiResta, social media researcher at Georgetown University, former research manager at Stanford Internet Observatory; Rachel Lobdell, Executive Director of News Creator Corps; and Dannagal Young, Director of the University of Delaware\u2019s Center for Political Communication.<\/p>\n

\"\"Left to right: Dr. Darrin Anderson Sr., Kerry Sautner, C70\u2019s Lauren Cristella and The 19th\u2019s Errin Haines. 3. The Participation Gap: Understanding and Reducing Voter Apathy <\/p>\n

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Celina Stewart, CEO of the League of Women Voters of the United States joined former Philadelphia City Commissioner Al Schmidt, now Secretary of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania; Marc Morial, President and CEO of the National Urban League; Rich Thau, President of Engagious and Creator of the Swing Voter Project; and moderator Heidi Przybyla, Founder, Get Real News to discuss the data around the country\u2019s uneven (and often unimpressive) rates of election participation \u2014 and what that tells us about how we can transform apathy into civic engagement.<\/p>\n

4. Bridging the Divide: Paths to Reducing Political Polarization <\/p>\n

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Renowned conservative commentator Michael Smerconish of CNN moderated a bipartisan panel about the notoriously wide divide between left and right in the United States. U.S. Representative Chrissy Houlahan, an Air Force veteran; Matt Levendusky, Director, Institutions of Democracy at Penn\u2019s Annenberg Public Policy Center; Krish O\u2019Mara Vignarajah, President & CEO of Global Refuge; and Max Stier, CEO of the Partnership for Public Service explored how leadership and practical reforms might rebuild bridges among Americans. Houlahan, Villieres says, \u201chustled up from a day of voting in Washington, D.C. \u2026 and provided valuable insights on the way she has worked with Representative Brian Fitzpatrick and several other of her Republican colleagues on multiple pieces of bipartisan legislation.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Michael Smerconish (left) and U.S. Representative Chrissy Houlahan. 5. The Rebalance of Power: Congress Reclaiming Its Role <\/p>\n

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Sarah Glover of WHYY explored the current state of checks and balances in Washington, D.C. with panelists former U.S. Representative Jim Gerlach of PA; Ramesh Ponnuru, nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute; U.S. Representative Mary Kay Scanlon of PA; and former U.S. Congressman from Virginia Glenn Nye, President & CEO of the Center for the Study of the Presidency & Congress, which has developed an interactive Democracy Innovation Timeline<\/a> featuring more than 50 innovations encapsulating a living Republic<\/p>\n

Plenary Keynote: David Brooks and Roxane Gay <\/p>\n

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The day wrapped with national commentary stars Roxane Gay, opinion writer at The New York Times and bestselling author, and David Brooks, formerly of The New York Times and currently of The Atlantic and PBS News Hour, talking \u201cpatriotism and national identity, the role of institutions and culture in shaping our democracy, and how we balance moral courage, critique, and protest with the need for civic cohesion and working together,\u201d said Villere, with WHYY\u2019s Cherri Gregg.<\/p>\n

\"\"Left to right: WHYY\u2019s Cherri Gregg, David Brooks and Roxane Gay. <\/p>\n

\"\" MORE CITIZEN DEMOCRACY<\/p>\n

Left to right: Former U.S. Congressman from Virginia Glenn Nye, President & CEO of the Center for the Study of the Presidency & Congress; Ramesh Ponnuru, nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, and U.S. Representative Mary Kay Scanlon. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This July, just about 10 days after the country \u2014 and Philadelphia \u2014 celebrated the semiquincentennial of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":264633,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[4158,69,71,70,40361],"class_list":["post-264632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-democracy","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news","tag-semiquincentennial-250th"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264632","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264632"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264632\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/264633"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}