Forum at Bergen Community College on Supreme Court Decision

Former Glen Rock resident Lisa Gilbert, the deputy director of Congress Watch at Public Citizen, will be one of the featured speakers at Citizens United--Free Speech or the Death of Demoracy? on May 5.

The program is being sponsored by the North Jersey Public Policy Network and will be held at Bergen Community College’s Pitkin Building, Room C-211 in Paramus from 7:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.

The program will cover the Supreme Court decision “Citizens’ United” and its implications for the future of elections in the United States. According the NJPPN, this ruling has made it legal for corporations to contribute unlimited amounts of money to election campaigns without disclosing their contributions. 

Gilbert, a Glen Rock High School graduate, has been quoted in the New York Times, The Associated Press, The Wall Street Journal and more and is also a featured contributor to the National Journal’s “Expert Blog” and the Huffington Post.

University of Baltimore law professor, Garrett Epps, an American legal scholar, novelist and journalist will also be speaking. Epps has been a reporter for the Washington Post, legal correspondent for The Atlantic Wire, contributor to Atlantic Monthly, New York Times and more. A constitutional expert, he is the author of Democracy Reborn: The Fourteenth Amendment, the Fight for Equal Rights in Post Civil War America and is a prize winning novelist.

Also on the panel is Zephyr Teachout, an associate professor of law at Fordham University Law School. Teachout co- founded and served as executive director of the Fair Trial Initiative, was the national director of the Sunlight Foundation, a visiting professor at Duke Law School as well as at Harvard University’s Kennedy School and has appeared on Bill Moyers Journal.

Following the speakers, Pierce Wilkinson, a professor of political science at Bergen Community College, will moderate a question and answer session and discussion.

This program is free and open to the public but due to limited seating, reservations are encouraged. Reservations can be made by e-mailing njppn.ed@gmail.com