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Highlights & Quotes Lehrman is a former drugstore executive turned conservative economic theorist turned Heritage Foundation big wig. He helped found Citizens for America, which was formed in 1983 by various conservative heavy hitters such as Holly Coors (the wife of Joseph Coors) to promote conservative causes. According to GroupWatch, CFA “worked closely with Oliver North in North's Contra supply efforts,” organizing briefings by Contra speakers that targeted congressional offices and encouraged congressional members to vote Contra aid. CFA was also the principal U.S. sponsor for a 1985 meeting of anticommunist ‘freedom fighters’ held in Angola. This conference produced at least three memoranda -- one from speechwriter Dana Rohrabacher to White House communications director Patrick Buchanan, one from Buchanan to National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane, and one from National Security Council staffer Walter Raymond to McFarlane. The memos discussed whether the president should send a personal message to the Angola meeting via Lehrman and whether Rohrabacher should attend the meeting. The conference was considered instrumental in pressuring the Reagan administration to authorize a $15 million aid package for UNITA in 1986. The conference also exerted pressure on the U.S. Congress and public to support the Nicaraguan Contras and the guerrillas in Afghanistan.” (5)

Lehrman has long advocated the return to the gold standard, a position that may have cost him a chance to serve in the Reagan administration, which considered him as a candidate for treasury secretary. (8)

He authored the 1993 book Real Money: The Case of the Gold Standard, and has published articles in Harper’s, the Washington Post, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, National Review, and Policy Review. (1)

He served in the U.S. Army. (1)