Ron Christie

Ron Christie is Founder and CEO of Christie Strategies LLC, a full-service communications and issues management firm in Washington, D.C. Christie is also the author of three books. His most recent title, Blackwards: How Black Leadership is Returning America to the Days of Separate but Equal was published in September 2012. His two previous books were Acting White: The Birth and Death of a Racial Slur (2010, St. Martin’s Press) and Black in the White House (2006, Thomas Nelson/Nelson Current). Christie served as a Resident Fellow at the John F. Kennedy School of Government Institute of Politics for the Fall 2011 term at Harvard University. He served as an Inaugural Resident Fellow at the University of Southern California (USC) Center for the Political Future for the Fall 2019 semester. In 2020 Christie was appointed as a Senior Practitioner Fellow at the Miller Center at the University of Virginia. He is a Member of the Senior Advisory Council at the George W. Bush Presidential Center in Dallas, Texas.

Christie serves as an Adjunct Professor at the McCourt Graduate School of Public Policy and the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University. In August 2015 he was named to the Board of Advisors for the inaugural Georgetown University Institute of Politics and Public Service. He also teaches as a Lecturer at New York University’s Washington D.C. campus where he leads a course entitled “Private Influence in Public Policy” during the Spring Semester. He teaches “The American Presidency” during the Fall Semester. He is a member of the Advisory Council of the John Brademas Center at New York University. In April 2018 he was asked by the Aspen Institute to moderate a two-day Socrates Seminar entitled: “Learning to Lead & The Role of Congress” for emerging thought leaders of color on Capitol Hill. He also presently serves as a Lecturer at Cornell University where he leads a seminar on Private Influence in Public Policy.

Mr. Christie, a veteran senior advisor of both the White House and the Congress, brings years of government relations experience. Most recently, Christie served as Vice President of Navigators LLC – a strategic consulting and communications firm. He previously served as Executive Vice President and Director of Global Government Affairs at Ruder Finn and Of Counsel at the DC law firm of Patton Boggs, LLP. From 2002 to 2004, he was Acting Director of USA Freedom Corps and special assistant to President George W. Bush. He began service at the White House in 2001 as deputy assistant to Vice President Cheney for domestic policy, advising the Vice President on policy initiatives in health care, budget, tax, and other policy areas.

Prior to joining the Vice President’s staff, he briefly served as counsel to U.S. Senator George Allen (R-VA). He also served as senior advisor to former House Budget Committee Chairman and former Ohio Governor John Kasich from 1992 – 1999. Christie is a Co-Founder of No Labels – a groundbreaking movement led by Americans who embrace the new politics of problem solving and are collaborating to find commonsense, non-partisan solutions to America’s toughest challenges. www.nolabels.org

A frequent commentator on current political events, Christie serves as a political analyst for BBC World in North America – a position he has held since 2014. He first appeared on their global 2012 election night coverage and reprised this role to cover the 2014 midterm election cycle as well as the 2016 presidential cycle. On January 8, 2019, BBC4 Radio debuted Christie’s first documentary “The Trumped Republicans,” a look at the first two years of the Trump Administration. https://bbc.in/2BJOWjq BBC World Service aired the documentary on February 13, 2019. This documentary was awarded the Bronze Medal for Best Documentary: Editorial or Viewpoint Programming in the world by the New York Festivals Radio Awards on April 16, 2020 – a competition with entrants from more than 43 countries from around the world.

Active in international affairs, he was elected as both a Term and Life Member to the Council on Foreign Relations. While serving in the White House, Christie was asked by President Bush to lead an American delegation to an international conference on volunteerism and civic engagement hosted by then Prime Minister Tony Blair in London, England. After the volunteerism summit, Christie worked with then Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown to devise an expanded call for civic engagement in Great Britain.

A native of Palo Alto, California, he received his B.A. from Haverford College and his J.D. from the George Washington University National Law Center. He serves as a member of board of directors of Unite America. He is also on the Board of Strategic Partnerships LLC.

SAG-AFTRA eligible as a background actor, you can catch Christie in the 2015 seasons of House of Cards and VEEP. He was commissioned as a member of the Honorable Order of Kentucky Colonels in 2011.