About: David Halperin
Twitter: @DaHalperin
Bio: David Halperin, a self-employed lawyer based in Washington DC, engages in public advocacy work on a wide range of issues, including higher education and climate change. He also advises organizations and companies on strategy, policy, communications, and legal matters, and he is of counsel to Public.Resource.org.
Halperin was previously: founding director of Campus Progress and senior vice president at the Center for American Progress; senior policy advisor for Howard Dean's presidential campaign; founding executive director of the American Constitution Society; White House speechwriter and special assistant for national security affairs to President Clinton; co-founder of the Internet company Progressive/RealNetworks; counsel to the Senate Intelligence Committee; and law clerk to U.S. District Judge Gerhard A. Gesell.
He has represented clients in the U.S. Supreme Court and various state and federal courts.
He writes at Republic Report, and his articles also have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, The Nation, Politico, Slate, Foreign Policy, and other outlets. In recent years he has testified before the House Oversight Committee and at the Federal Trade Commission and Department of Transportation, and spoken at major events held by the National Consumer Law Center, Consumer Federation of America, Arizona State University, American Educational Research Association, and Center for American Progress.
Halperin has served for more than a decade on the board of directors of Public Citizen.
He graduated from Yale College and Yale Law School.
For-Profit College CEO Said CFPB’s Chopra Should Be Abused At Guantanamo
On October 2, 2015, Kevin Modany, the CEO of ITT Educational Services, Inc., then one of the biggest for-profit college operations in the United States, sent an email to company lawyers about Rohit Chopra, an assistant director at the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. “This guy,” Modany wrote, “should be sent to Guantanamo Bay for
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As House Education Chair Probes For-Profit Colleges, Ranking Republican Foxx Takes Their Donations
As chair of the House Education and Labor Committee, Rep. Bobby Scott’s responsibilities include protecting against waste, fraud, and abuse with the hundreds of billions in federal aid dollars that go to U.S. colleges and universities. Rep. Scott (D-VA) has diligently met that obligation, holding hearings and asking questions of controversial college operators and the
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Department of Education Deepens Probe of Perdoceo
USA Today over the weekend reported that it had obtained an internal U.S. Department of Education email indicating that the Department, in December, requested information from for-profit college company Perdoceo, which runs American Intercontinental University (AIU) and Colorado Technical University (CTU). The Department also asked Perdoceo (which was known until 2020 as Career Education Corp.)
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Groups Call on Education Department to Improve Oversight of Accreditors
Fifteen organizations (and me) have sent a letter calling on the U.S. Department of Education to strengthen its reviews of accreditors, with a focus on accreditor oversight of schools with poor student outcomes and predatory practices. Accreditors that the Department approves serve as gatekeepers for federal student aid: Students who enroll at schools approved by
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U. of Arizona Pulls Predatory Ashford U. Closer
At a trial in a San Diego courtroom late last year, lawyers from the California attorney general’s office presented powerful evidence regarding years of predatory abuses against students by for-profit Ashford University. The case now awaits a verdict by the presiding state judge. Meanwhile, the school has come under increasing scrutiny by its accreditor, WASC,
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House Education Chair Questions Non-Profit Status of Keiser University
This morning, Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA), chair of the House Education and Labor Committee, called on the U.S. Department of Education to reconsider the non-profit status of Florida’s Keiser University and its parent institution, Everglades College, after a review by the Committee found that school president Arthur Keiser and other insiders have received millions of
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New University of Phoenix Head Ran College That Closed After Fraud Suit
For-profit college giant the University of Phoenix today named George A. Burnett its new president. Burnett, slated to start work next week, was once the CEO of Denver-based Alta Colleges, operator of Westwood College, which closed in 2015 in the wake of a devastating legal complaint, alleging systematic deceptions of students, filed by the state
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For-Profit College Reps at Education Meeting Are Part Of Trade Group That Has Harbored Predatory Abusers
Bradley Adams, the chief operating officer of South College and the lead negotiator for the for-profit college industry in this week’s Department of Education rule-making meetings, has criticized proposed rules that would hold career college programs more accountable for deceiving students and burying them in debt. Predictably, Adams has repeated the industry’s mantra that all
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