David Keene has been involved in the fields of public policy and politics since 1968. He worked in the Nixon White House as a political assistant to Vice President Agnew and on Capitol Hill as executive assistant to Senator James L. Buckley. His business experience involves both domestic and international trade policy issues.

As southern regional coordinator for Ronald Reagan's presidential nomination campaign in 1976 and national political director for George Bush in 1980, he won recognition for his skill as a political organizer and strategist. He was a senior political consultant to presidential candidate Robert Dole in 1988. Today, in addition to his professional duties, he is a regular columnist for The Hill (a newspaper covering Congress) and chairman of the American Conservative Union.

A graduate of Wisconsin Law School, he has been a John F. Kennedy Fellow at Harvard University, a member of the Board of Visitors of the Duke University Public Policy School, and a visiting professional scholar at the Freedom Forum First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt University.