Open the Debates!

Eli Beckerman, founder of an organization known as “Open the Debates,” drops by to describe this organization and its attempts to establish fair and open presidential debates. Eli describes how the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) is NOT a government-run fair organization. Quite the contrary, it is a privately run group that operates with extreme bias against anyone who is not a part of the political duopoly. Open the Debates is a grassroots, cross-partisan group that advocates for wrestling the debate stage away from the CPD and opening it up to all candidates running presidential campaigns across the nation. Only by having these debates conducted in an open fashion can ordinary citizens effectively participate in our democracy and understand the issues and, more importantly, understand what our presidential candidates really think about the important issues of the day.

Eli Beckerman is a strategic thinker, organizer, and communications professional working to open up the U.S. political system to new ideas, fresh voices, and better choices. After years of organizing to build the Green Party as a viable political alternative, he started working with Libertarians, political independents, and others to create Open the Debates as a cross-partisan vehicle to transform the political discourse and political realities of the United States.