About Us

Lydia Camarillo serves as President of the Southwest Voter Registration Education Project (SVREP), the country’s oldest and largest nonpartisan Latino voter participation program. She also is President of SVREP’s William C. Velasquez Institute (WCVI) and serves on the SVREP and WCVI Board of Directors.

Taking the helm of SVREP in 2018 after the untimely passing of Antonio Gonzales, the longest-serving president in the organization’s history, Ms. Camarillo has helped SVREP to grow the registration of Latino voters from 5.4 million in 1994 to over 18.6 million in 2020. Latino voter turnout increased from 5 million to 16.6 million, from 1994 to 2020.

Named one of the 100 Sisters in Suffrage by the National Organization of Women in 2020 to celebrate the passage of the 19th Amendment to the US Constitution, Ms. Camarillo has a long history of working to register, educate and promote voting among the nation’s growing population of Latino citizens. She started her career working as a field organizer for the Latino Issues Forum and Monterey Bay Girl Scouts and then joined the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF) in 1989 as National Leadership Director. In 1994, Ms. Camarillo joined SVREP as Executive Director, a post she held until 1999. She was then tapped by President Bill Clinton to be the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the 2000 Democratic National Convention, served on several political campaigns, and in 2003 returned to SVREP as Vice President, a position she held until being named President in 2018.

Besides her work leading SVREP and WCVI, Ms. Camarillo serves as Chair of the Texas Latino Redistricting Task Force and as Chair of the Texas Senate Latino Caucus and Mexican American Legislative Task Force as well as being on numerous boards and commissions. Additionally, she serves on the Earth Day Network and the King Awards Board of Directors. Among her many honors, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund bestowed Ms. Camarillo with the Lifetime Achievement -Excellence in Community Service Award in 2021 and she was named twice by Latina Magazine as one of the 10 most influential Latinas in the US.

A native Texan, Dr. Charles W. Christian is a pastor, ethicist, and broadcast journalist now living in St. Joseph, Missouri. Currently, he is a news anchor and reporter with the News-Press & Gazette Company, which includes daily and weekly newspapers in Missouri and Kansas and 15 television and radio stations in the Western states.

At the same time, Dr. Christian, who holds a PhD in systematic and moral theology through the University of South Africa in Pretoria, teaches in seminaries and universities, work he has done for over 20 years. This includes serving as Affiliate Associate Professor of theology and ethics at Fuller Theological Seminary and as an Adjunct Professor of religion at MidAmerica Nazarene University in Olanthe, Kansas. Moreover, as an ordained minister in the Church of the Nazarene, Dr. Christian has pastored for nearly 30 years at churches in Texas, Oregon, Washington State and Missouri. Presently, he serves as a minister in the Missouri Conference of the United Methodist Church.

Having received his undergraduate degree in marketing from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, and then an M.Div. from Southwestern Seminary in Ft. Worth, Dr. Christian is also a weekly columnist and a published author, contributing to or authoring several books. From 2017 to 2019 he was the Managing Editor of Holiness Today and Grace and Peace Magazines for the Church of the Nazarene and the Communications Coordinator for the USA/Canada Region.

A businesswoman, environmental activist, and strategic philanthropist, Molly O. Ross is President of Swift Wings Foundation, whose mission is to spread the message of hope for a sustainable future. The foundation funds, creates, and develops initiatives working toward sustainability and a more just society in furtherance of democracy and equal justice. She also serves as President of her family’s companies, Deltex Royalty Company, Inc. and LMA Royalties, Ltd.

A lifelong Republican, Ms. Ross works in the center of politics, where the greatest freedom lies and where democracy best expresses itself. Accordingly, she is a national advisor to RepublicEN, which was co- founded by former South Carolina Republican Congressman, Bob Inglis, and works with the EcoRight, a group of Center Right organizations promoting a conservative approach to Climate Change. She is also a national advisor to American Farmland Trust and is involved in regenerative agriculture initiatives across the country.

Committed to confronting the challenge of climate change, Ms. Ross serves as Board Vice Chair of Rachel’s Network, a nonprofit organization of women working through environmental advocacy, philanthropy and leadership to forge solutions. In this role, she met Rev. Richard Cizik when he was with the National Association of Evangelicals, and Rachel’s Network partnered with Rev. Cizik to promote Creation Care, the Evangelical response to Climate Change.

In terms of a global response to climate change, Ms. Ross serves on the Board of earthday.org, the governing organization of global Earth Day events and initiatives, where in 2017 she co-founded the India’s Healthy Energy Future Campaign with the organization’s President, Kathleen Rogers, and the Regional Director of Asia, Karuna Singh. Additionally, she is a Board member and Executive Producer of Idanha Films, Inc, which in 2012 produced a documentary called “Arise” that tells the stories of women around the world who are actively working to heal the planet. Translated into French and Spanish, the film was screened at the COP 21 United Nations Climate Change Summit in Paris, France in late 2015.

A member of the Evangelical Theological Society, Dr. William Klein is Professor Emeritus of New Testament Interpretation at Denver Seminary. He formerly served as chair of the Division of Biblical Studies. His areas of academic interest and research include Pauline theology, NT theology, and hermeneutics.

Dr. Klein, who earned a PhD from the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, an MDiv from Denver Seminary, and a BS from Wheaton College, joined Denver Seminary in 1978, serving as associate academic dean from 1994 until 2001. He also served Calvary Baptist Church in California as associate pastor and has served as an elder in three local churches during his years in Denver.

As a Biblical scholar, Dr. Klein edited and was the major contributor to An Introduction to Biblical Interpretation and has consulted on several Bible versions, serving as chief exegetical consultant for the New Testament portion of The Message. He is the author of “Ephesians” in the revised edition of the Expositor’s Bible Commentary; Become What You Are: Spiritual Formation According to the Sermon on the Mount; the notes on “Ephesians” and “Romans” in the Apologetics Study Bible; the Handbook for Personal Bible Study; What is My Calling? (with Daniel Steiner); as well as other books, and many articles.

Dr. Richard Gathro, a pioneer in his field, spent over 40 years in Christian higher education as a teacher, program director, administrator and policymaker. Among his many positions, Dr. Gathro was the Executive Vice President of the Council for Christian College & Universities, an association of 182 campuses in 24 countries and headquartered in Washington, D.C. Additionally, he was a pastor on Capitol Hill and involved in the National Prayer Breakfast event for many years.

Dr. Gathro also played a number of leadership roles in education at the university level. He was the Chief Enrollment Officer at Trinity International University, Dean of Nyack College’s Washington, DC campus, where he founded the Institute for Public Service and Policy Development, and the Director of Pepperdine University’s Washington, DC program. In addition, Dr. Gathro has traveled the globe as a teacher in the fields of public policy and psychology, lecturing in Costa Rica, England, Hungary, Russia, China and Uganda. Now living in Largo, Florida where he serves on three nonprofit boards, Dr. Gathro holds graduate degrees in psychology and church history and a doctorate in education and theology.

An expert in democracy on a global scale, Dr. Melvis N. Ndilosheh works in the U.S. as an independent consultant on human rights, democracy, and peace, providing counsel to such international organizations as the African Union, European Union, United Nations Economic Commission for Africa and the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance.

Dr. Ndilosheh, who holds a PhD in politics and human rights, is also CEO of the Foundation for Peace and Solidarity, a Cameroon-based nonprofit with outreach operations across Africa, which works to reconcile conflict-ridden communities through human rights and peace education. The organization also runs a pioneering flagship international training program on democracy, hosts forums and education tours, and conducts grassroots programs through Peace and Human Rights Clubs in schools, colleges, and youth camps.

In addition, Dr. Ndiloseh is a Senior Lecturer at the International Relations Institute of Cameroon where many diplomats from African countries are trained. She also serves as a visiting professor at African universities, lecturing on the African human rights system, peace, and security issues and lighting the path for change by mentoring and coaching hundreds of graduate students and aspiring diplomats.

An epidemiologist and award-winning author, Dr. Daniel Halperin has conducted research for 40 years on various health and sociocultural issues in Latin America, Africa, and other regions. Since 2011 he has served as an Adjunct Full Professor at the University of North Carolina Gillings School of Global Public Health in Chapel Hill. Dr. Halperin received a B.A. in Economics and Development Studies in 1979 and an M.S. in Health and Medical Sciences in 1982 from the University of California, Berkeley.

Completing his doctoral training in medical and cultural anthropology and epidemiology at the University of California, Berkeley in 1995, Dr. Halperin has taught at Harvard School of Public Health, the University of California in San Francisco, and the Ponce School of Medicine in Puerto Rico. From 2001 to 2006, he worked as the Senior HIV Prevention and Behavior Change Advisor at the U.S. Agency for International Development and had extensive involvement with the World Health Organization, Centers for Disease Control and others in the design and evaluation of prevention, care and other HIV-AIDS programs. In more recent years, he has focused on the obesity and COVID-19 pandemics.

A well-known author, Dr. Halperin has published over 60 peer-reviewed papers on infectious diseases, many in leading scientific journals such as The Lancet and Science, as well as numerous pieces in the Washington Post, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and the Financial Times. He also co-authored a New York Times “Editor’s Choice” book on the AIDS pandemic, has published over 10 articles on COVID-19, and in 2020 released “Facing COVID Without Panic,” a book to help set the record straight on the science of the virus and to relieve the public’s anxiety about COVID due to misleading, exaggerated, or conflicting information disseminated on the internet and in the news media.

Dr. Halperin has collaborated with Reverend Richard Cizik on some initiatives funded by the United Nations Foundation to prevent unwanted pregnancies and abortions, by expanding access to family planning services in developing countries. Raised Jewish (his father was a Holocaust scholar), he has been active over the years with a variety of faith-based organizations, including Christian Connections for International Health.

Dr. Jerry S. Herbert (Ph.D., Duke Univ., political science) has taught and written in the areas of politics, policy, leadership, vocation, and citizenship. Jerry has a passion for helping followers of Jesus explore and understand their personal, professional, and public commitments in the light of their faith convictions.

The year before the pandemic, Jerry was with InterVarsity Graduate Faculty Ministries as an Interim Volunteer Campus Staff at the George Washington University. Previously he served as adjunct professor of public policy at the Washington DC programs of Nyack and Pepperdine universities after directing and teaching for 28 years at the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities’ American Studies Program on Capitol Hill.

Jerry enjoys hiking, running, reading biographies and historical novels, and watching “The Crown” on Netflix with his wife Jeannie. Jerry and Jeannie live in Northern Virginia and attend Washington Community Fellowship on Capitol Hill at 9th & Maryland, NE, where he serves as an elder. Jeannie and Jerry have three adult sons and five grandchildren.