David W. Burke was named to the first Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) by President Clinton in 1995 and served as its first chairman, leaving the board in 2002. His BBG legacy includes the David Burke Distinguished Journalism Award, which recognizes the courage, integrity, and professionalism of individuals in reporting the news within the BBG broadcast entities. Burke arrived at the BBG as director and a trustee of various Dreyfus Funds. Previously, he served as President of CBS News and served as both Vice President and Executive Vice President of ABC News.
Marc B. Nathanson was named to the first BBG by President Clinton in 1995 and served until 2002. He came to the board as Vice Chairman of Charter Communications, the nation’s fourth largest cable television operator, serving more than six million subscribers throughout the United States. Mr. Nathanson’s career in the cable TV industry spanned decades and in 1982 he was elected a member of “Cable Pioneers.” He has served on the boards of the Annenberg School of Communications at the University of Southern California, UCLA’s Anderson School of Management and UCLA’s Center for Communications Policy. He later became Chairman of Mapleton Investments LLC and Mapleton Capital Management LLC, a vice chairman of the National Democratic Institute and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Mr. Nathanson is a former member of the Albanian-American Enterprise Fund.
Tom C. Korologos was named to the board by President Clinton in 1995 and served until 2001. Mr. Korologos came to the board as President of Timmons & Company, a government relations consulting firm and later served as US Ambassador to Belgium from 2004 to 2007. A former journalist in Salt Lake City and New York City, he previously served as the Chairman of the United States Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy and as a member of the Board of Directors of the International Media Fund. He is the former Chief of Staff to U.S. Senator Wallace F. Bennett and a White House Assistant to Presidents Nixon and Ford.
Edward E. Kaufman was named to the BBG by President Clinton and is the longest tenured member of the board serving from 1995 until 2008. He came to the board as president of Public Strategies, a political and management consulting firm in Wilmington, Delaware and a senior lecturer at Duke University School of Law and the Fuqua School of Business. He was later appointed to the U.S. Senate seat left vacant when Joe Biden was elected vice president, serving from 2009 until 2010. He served as a trustee of Christiana Care Corporation and as a member of the Board of Directors of Children and Families First. Previously, he worked in various technical, financial, and marketing positions with the DuPont Company.
Bette Bao Lord was named to the board by President Clinton in 1995 and served until 2000. Ms. Lord came to the board as a recognized author and lecturer whose works include Legacies: A Chinese Mosaic, which was chosen by Time Magazine as one of the ten best non-fiction books of 1990, and Spring Moon, a New York Times bestseller and nominee for the American Book Award. Her other works include In The Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson, 1984, and The Middle Heart, 1996. She also served as Chair of the Freedom House Board of Trustees and on the Board of Trustees of the Freedom Forum .
Alberto Mora was named to the board by President Clinton in 1995 and served until 2001. He came to board as an attorney in private practice with the law firm of Greenberg Traurig in Washington, D.C., where his focus was international law. A former State Department Foreign Service officer, Mr. Mora served as General Counsel for the United States Information Agency from 1989 to 1993. He was later named general counsel of the Navy by President George W. Bush.
Cheryl Halpern was named to the board by President Clinton in 1995 and served until 2002. She came to the board after participating extensively in community activities on the national, state, and local levels. She served on the Boards of the International Republican Institute and the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. She also serves as the Chairperson of the B’nai B’rith International United Nations Committee. From 1990 to 1995, Ms. Halpern served as a member of the Board for International Broadcasting, the predecessor to the Broadcasting Board of Governors.
Carl Spielvogel was named to the board in 1995 by President Clinton and served until 2000. He came to the board as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Carl Spielvogel Associates, Inc., a global investment and communications company. Mr. Spielvogel also served as the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Backer Spielvogel Bates Worldwide, Inc., one of the world’s largest marketing, communications, and advertising companies. Earlier, he was a reporter and columnist at the New York Times for eight years. He served as US ambassador to the Slovak Republic during 2000 and 2001 and is a member of the Council of American Ambassadors, and the Council on Foreign Relations.
Norman J. Pattiz was named to the board by President Clinton in 2000 and served until 2006. He is founder and Chairman of Westwood One, America’s largest radio network. Westwood One owns, manages or distributes the NBC Radio Network, CBS Radio Network, the Mutual Broadcasting System, CNN Radio, Fox Radio Network, Metro Networks, Metro Traffic and Shadow Traffic. Mr. Pattiz has received an Honorary Doctorate in Fine Arts from Southern Illinois University. He also has served as a Commissioner on California’s 21st Century Infrastructure Commission. He has served as president of the Broadcast Education Association, a trustee of the Museum of Television & Radio and the Hollywood Radio & Television Society. Mr. Pattiz is the primary benefactor of the Hamilton High Academy of Music and the Norman J. Pattiz Concert Hall. He also serves on the Communications Board of UCLA and the Dean’s Advisory Board of Cal State Fullerton.
Robert M. Ledbetter, Jr. was appointed to the board by President Clinton in 2000 and served until 2003. He came to the board as Vice President and General Manager of WTVA Inc.,which operates WTVA TV and has programming or sales agreements with WLOV TV and WKDH TV in Tupelo, Mississippi. He also served as Vice President of WMDN Inc., which operates WMDN TV and has a local marketing agreement with WGBC TV in Meridian, Mississippi. He also served on the Board of Directors BlueCross BlueShield of Mississippi. Mr. Ledbetter has served as chairman of the Tupelo Symphony Orchestra and on the board of directors of numerous civic organizations. He began his career as an announcer on WAMY in Amory, Mississippi, and later became a news director and news anchor at television stations in Meridian, Jackson and Tupelo, Mississippi before assuming television management responsibilities in 1978.
Kenneth Y. Tomlinson was appoint to the board by President George W. Bush in 2002 and served until 2007. He came to board as a former Director of the Voice of America with more than 35 years of journalistic experience. He began his career as a reporter for the Richmond Times-Dispatch in 1965. In 1968, he joined the Washington bureau of Reader’s Digest, serving as a correspondent in Vietnam, and eventually in Paris, where he covered events in Europe, Africa and the Middle East. In 1982, President Ronald Reagan appointed Tomlinson Director of VOA, where he served until 1984. After his tenure at VOA, Tomlinson returned to Reader’s Digest to serve as managing editor. He was subsequently named executive editor of the magazine in 1985 and editor-in-chief in 1989. He retired from Reader’s Digest in 1996.
Steven J. Simmons was named to the board in 2002 by President George W. Bush and served until 2010. He came to the board as Chairman and CEO of Patriot Media and Communications, LLC, a company formed to purchase cable companies in the United States. From 1982-1994, he served as chairman and chief executive officer of Simmons Communications, Inc. (SCI). Mr. Simmons founded SCI, which owned and managed cable companies, in 1981. Prior to starting SCI, Mr. Simmons served almost four years as an assistant and then as associate director on the White House’s domestic policy staff.
Joaquin F. Blaya was named to the board by President George W. Bush in 2002 and served until 2010. He came to the board as chairman and chief executive officer of Radio Unica Communications Corporation. Radio Unica is a Spanish-language AM talk and sports radio network that targets Hispanics in the United States. Previously, he served as CEO of the Telemundo Group, Inc., the nation’s second-largest Spanish-language television network. Mr. Blaya also served as president of Univision Holdings, Inc., the nation’s largest Spanish-language media company. Before coming to the United States in 1966, he worked in several marketing and media firms.
D. Jeffrey Hirschberg was named to the board by President George W. Bush in 2002 and served until 2010. He came to the board as Director of the Corporate Responsibility Practice at Howrey, Simon, Arnold and White, LLP (global legal advisors). Mr. Hirschberg retired from Ernst & Young in 1999 as vice chairman/governmental affairs. Previously, he worked as a private attorney in Washington, D.C., and Milwaukee, Wisconsin. From 1972-1980, Mr. Hirschberg worked for the U.S. Justice Department as a special attorney and deputy chief of the criminal division’s special litigation section. He also prosecuted civil and criminal matters as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Milwaukee.
Blanquita Walsh Cullum was named to the board in 2002 by President George W. Bush and served until 2010. She came to the board as a radio broadcaster whose nationally syndicated programs BQ View and Newsbeat were carried coast-to-coast by the Radio America Network. She was the founder of the Young American Broadcasters Program. Ms. Cullum began her broadcasting career in San Antonio, Texas, where she worked for KENS-TV, KITE-Radio, KTSA-Radio and KSJL-Radio. She has also worked as marketing director for the Coors Corporation, and marketing specialist for the National Bureau of the Census. She served as White House liaison to the Federal Emergency Management Agency and executive assistant to the deputy director of FEMA during President George H.W. Bush’s administration. She also served as president of the National Association of Radio Talk Show Hosts.
Veronique Rodman was named to the board by President George W. Bush in 2003 and served until 2004. She came to the board as the director of public affairs at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research (AEI), a Washington-based think tank. From 1982-1995, she served as a producer of ABC-TV’s This Week With David Brinkley. As a television news consultant, she helped launch Fox News Sunday. Ms. Rodman also worked as vice president for the Cosmetic, Toiletries and Fragrance Association Foundation, and as program coordinator for the SAIS-Novartis Prize for Excellence in International Journalism. Born and raised in Egypt, Ms. Rodman also worked for Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and for CSIS’s Congressional Leadership Group on International Communication. Earlier she was assistant director for “The World of Islam” festival in London.
Mark McKinnon was named to the board in 2006 by President George W. Bush and served until 2008. He came to the board as vice chairman of Public Strategies and president of Maverick Media. He is an award-winning media producer and communications strategist who has served as principal media adviser for hundreds of corporate and political campaigns in the United States, Latin America and Africa, including President George W. Bush’s 2000 and 2004 presidential campaigns and John McCain’s primary campaign in 2007-2008. He served on the board of the Lance Armstrong Foundation and lectured at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin and at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.
James K. Glassman was named to the board by President George W. Bush in 2007 and served until 2008. Later, as Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, he represented Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on the BBG from June 2008 until January 2009. He served as BBG Chairman from June 2007 until June 2008. Previously, Glassman was a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. Glassman is the former president of The Atlantic Monthly Co., publisher of The New Republic, Executive Vice President of U.S. News & World Report, editor-in-chief and co-owner of Roll Call, host of Capital Gang Sunday and a Washington Post columnist. Glassman served on the congressionally-mandated Advisory Group on Public Diplomacy for the Arab and Muslim World.
Walter Isaacson was named to the board by President Obama in 2010 and served as its chairman until 2012. Isaacson is President of the Aspen Institute and serves as chair of the board of Teach for America. He is the former Chairman and CEO of CNN and former editor of Time Magazine. Mr. Isaacson is the author of Steve Jobs, Einstein: His Life and Universe and Benjamin Franklin: An American Life, and the co-author of The Wise Men. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, he was appointed vice-chairman of the Louisiana Recovery Authority.
S. Enders Wimbush was named to the board by President Obama in 2010. He is Senior Director, Foreign Policy and Civil Society at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. From 1987-93, he served as Director of Radio Liberty in Munich, Germany.
