Our Team

Lisa Graves is one of the nation’s foremost experts in exposing how special interests distort public policy and try to thwart the public’s interest in a thriving democracy and healthy planet. She is the Executive Director of True North Research, a national investigative watchdog group that works with other journalists and researchers to shine a light on the dark money fueling regressive agendas targeting vital institutions in our republic, such as the courts and schools. She served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Policy Development/Legal Policy at the U.S. Department of Justice, Chief Counsel for Nominations for Senator Patrick Leahy on the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, Deputy Chief of the Article III Judges Division of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, and as an adjunct law professor at George Washington University Law School. She also served as the Senior Legislative Strategist for the ACLU on national security and civil liberties, and held other posts. She has been asked to testify as an expert before several committees in the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives. Her investigations have been featured in Ava DuVernay’s Oscar-nominated documentary the “13th,” in Showtime’s “Years of Living Dangerously,” in a PBS documentary narrated by Bill Moyers and entitled “The United States of ALEC,” and other films. Her research has been cited in critically acclaimed books including Dark Money by Jane Mayer, Democracy in Chains by Nancy MacLean, Give Us the Ballot by Ari Berman, Corporate Citizen by Ciara Torres-Spelliscy, The Fall of Wisconsin by Dan Kaufman, and several others. Her work is featured in several podcasts, including U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse’s “Making the Case,” Crooked Media and Rebecca Nagle’s “This Land,” Dahlia Lithwick’s “Amicus,” Vicky Ward’s new series on the Federalist Society called “Pipeline to Power,” Pod Save America, and Amy Westervelt’s “Drilled.” Her op-eds have been published by the New York Times, the Guardian, TIME, Slate, and The Hill, and she has written for True North Research, PRWatch, Common Dreams, TruthOut, Ms., Washington Spectator, DeSmog, the Nation, In These Times, the Progressive, HuffPo, and Yes!. Her analysis has been cited in the New York Times, the Guardian, the Washington Post, Politico, ProPublica, Salon, the Trace, Grist, Bloomberg, Reuters, the Associated Press, the New Yorker, the Atlantic, Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone, The Intercept, Vice, ESPN, Business Week, Roll Call, CQ, Newsday, the National Journal, Legal Times, Wired, the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, the Boston Globe, USA Today, Rewire News, the Toronto Star, Agence France-Presse, and more. She has been a frequent guest on MSNBC and has also appeared on CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, CNBC, the BBC, the CBC, Sky News, the Laura Flanders Show, Democracy NOW!, and C-Span. She has also been a featured guest on major radio programs, including NPR’s Fresh Air, Morning Edition, and Marketplace Report, and on Deutschlandfunk, FAIR, Background Briefing with Ian Masters, the Nicole Sanders Show, Duncan Campbell’s Connections, the Thom Hartmann Show, BradBlog, the Rick Smith Show, the Zero Hour with R.J. Eskow, and more.

Raymond Paultre is the Executive Director of the Florida Alliance, co-founder of Project 68 (P68), and is currently working with a group of funders and organizers to expand his work around: 1) state communications and research capacities and 2) organizing cultural power – including his work with athletes as a part of Project 68 (P68) team and restructuring ACRONYM.

For over a decade, Raymond has worked on or helped to fund significant and impactful initiatives in Florida, beginning during the 2012 cycle on Obama’s reelection campaign and for three years led Enroll America’s efforts in FL, helping to power Florida to the nation’s largest increase in health insurance sign-ups three years in a row.

Since Raymond took the helm in 2019, the Florida Alliance has seen a 700% increase in membership, raised over $50 million towards organizations and infrastructure in Florida, and has quickly become the most diverse collaborative in the country.

Donna F. Edwards served five terms (2008-2017) in the United States House of Representatives, becoming the first African American woman to represent Maryland. Congresswoman Edwards was born in North Carolina, grew up in a military family, and lived in every region of the country and internationally. She earned her J.D. from the University of New Hampshire School of Law (licensed in DC) and her B.A. from Wake Forest University. She is the mother of one adult son.

As a nonprofit executive, Congresswoman Edwards co-founded and led the National Network to End Domestic Violence, spearheading the effort to pass the Violence Against Women Act in 1994. She was the executive director of the Arca Foundation and Center for a New Democracy, and was a tireless democracy advocate for Public Citizen. Edwards was a systems engineer on NASA’s Spacelab project. She currently serves as vice-chair of the U.S. Association of Former Members of Congress, co-chair of the National Council on Election Integrity, the League of Conservation Voters, and is a trustee of Wake Forest University.

In Congress, Edwards served on the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, Committee on Standards and Official Conduct, the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, and the Committee on Science, Space and Technology, as the lead Democrat on the Subcommittee on Space.  Congresswoman Edwards was a member of the Democratic leadership team as co-chair of the House Democrat’s Steering and Policy Committee. She was co-chair of the bi-partisan Women’s Caucus.

Edwards enjoys camping, hiking and fishing throughout the United States in her Rv Lucille, having recently completed a two-month adventure to Alaska. Congresswoman Edwards provides political commentary in print, electronic, and cable media. Edwards is a political analyst for NBC/MSNBC Universal. She is senior advisor to the Bauman Foundation and trustee of the Park Foundation.

Alicia Park Wittink is the Vice President of the Park Foundation. Alicia has been involved with the Foundation since 1998 in varying capacities and was instrumental in nurturing the Foundation’s program interests in both water and plastic reduction. Alicia has also helped in the formation of the Amazon Conservation Association; she has worked at The International Ecotourism Association, The Center for a New American Dream (aka: New Dream), and the Sierra Club of Virginia. Alicia has also served on the boards of: Environmental Working Group, Friends of the Earth, Center for a New American Dream, and the Foundation for National Progress, publisher of Mother Jones Magazine. Together with Leda Huta, Alicia co-founded EcoWomen, a nonprofit with five chapters that empower environmental leaders. Alicia graduated from Cornell University with a degree in Entrepreneurship and Environmental Studies. She lives in Ithaca, NY, and is an incredibly proud mother of two.