America’s rural future: Announcing the Brookings-AEI Commission on US Rural Prosperity

For too many policymakers and too many of our nation’s media and cultural power brokers, rural America remains an afterthought. Our elite institutions congregate in urban centers of power, and political dialogue pays special heed to the influence of suburbia. Home to nearly one in five Americans, rural communities are often discounted as monolithic, masking their demographic, economic, and cultural diversity. These narratives also obscure rural America’s true role as a nexus of energy production, a backbone of domestic manufacturing, and the source of the nation’s food and water supply. Its importance to the rest of the country continues to receive insufficient policy attention, especially as geographic disparities in opportunity and well-being grow. 

The Brookings Institution and the American Enterprise Institute are launching a high-level, bipartisan commission focused on broadening equitable rural prosperity and resilience. Co-chaired by former U.S. Senator Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and former New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu, this partnership aims to elevate the national policy discourse on rural development and offer practical, cross-partisan solutions grounded in local realities. Its activities and research will be facilitated by Tony Pipa, senior fellow at the Brookings Center for Sustainable Development, and Brent Orrell, senior fellow at AEI. 

On Tuesday, July 1, Brookings will host a public launch to outline the activities and objectives of this joint effort. After opening remarks from the presidents of Brookings and AEI, and framing comments from Pipa and Orrell, the event will feature a fireside chat with Heitkamp and Sununu on their shared commitment to rural America and the goals of this new policy initiative.

There will be opportunities for audience Q&A. Please submit questions via email at [email protected] or by using the hashtag #RuralCommission on X and Bluesky. For media inquiries, please contact [email protected].