Alan Khazei

On April 26, 2011, Khazei announced that he would be a candidate in the 2012 U.S. Senate election to represent Massachusetts, in an effort to unseat Republican Senator Scott Brown.

In response to the entry on September 15 of Harvard Law Professor Elizabeth Warren into the Senate campaign, Khazei issued a direct challenge to the other Democratic candidates — and specifically to Warren — to forego campaign funds from corporate lobbyists and all Political Action Committees. He pledged to do so himself. The Boston Globe's Noah Bierman reported that Khazei was leading the field of Democratic candidates in campaign funds as of the previous reporting period (June 30, 2011) with a reported total of $920,000, but that Senator Brown had a dramatic lead over all of the Democrats, having amassed about $9.6 million in campaign funds as of June.

He signaled on October 26, 2011, that he planned to withdraw from the race, citing a lack of funds and media attention in the wake of Elizabeth Warren's entry into the race.

Khazei has led two unsuccessful campaigns for U.S. Senator from Massachusetts. He placed third in the Democratic primary in the 2010 special election, and withdrew from the primary in the 2012 election due to lack of funds and media attention after Elizabeth Warren got into the race. In September 2019, Khazei announced that he is running for U.S. Representative from Massachusetts's 4th congressional district.

Khazei ran to fill the United States Senate seat left vacant by the death of Senator Edward M. Kennedy. He sought the Democratic Party's nomination for this seat in the Democratic primary on December 8, 2009. He came in third, behind Congressman Michael E. Capuano and winner Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley.

In November 2009, The Boston Globe endorsed Khazei for Senate, writing: "With high hopes, the Globe endorses Alan Khazei, the prime mover behind national-service policies, as Massachusetts' best chance to produce another great senator."

Khazei was recognized as one of NonProfit Times' 2008 "Executives of the Year" for his work in organizing ServiceNation, a summit event held in New York City on September 11, 2008 that featured then-presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain alongside over 700 other national service leaders. At the summit, Obama and McCain together pledged to expand national service in an event that was broadcast on national television. Reaching an estimated 100 million Americans through its 200 non-profit member groups, ServiceNation played a leading role in the drafting and April 2009 enactment of the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act, which authorizes the greatest expansion of national service in America since President Franklin D. Roosevelt created the Civilian Conservation Corps. The ServiceNation coalition continued to advocate legislation promoting national service, such as that proposed by Governors Arnold Schwarzenegger of California and David Paterson of New York to create cabinet-level positions for service and volunteering.

In 2006, US News and World Report named Khazei one of "America's 25 Best Leaders" and the Boston Globe Magazine named him as one of "11 Bostonians Changing the World". He is a recipient of the Reebok Human Rights Award, the Samuel S. Beard Jefferson Award for Public Service, the Caring Institute Award, the William Jefferson Clinton Award, the Jefferson Award for Public Service, and the Harvard Law School Association Outstanding Alumni Award. He has received honorary degrees from Clark University, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Northeastern University, Suffolk University, and Mount Ida College.

In June 2003, AmeriCorps funding was cut by 80 percent. Khazei and other service leaders organized the "Save AmeriCorps" act, a grassroots campaign culminating in a 100-hour hearing in the Capitol. At this hearing, more than 700 AmeriCorps supporters testified.

This campaign led to half of the AmeriCorps funding being restored in 2003 and to all of the previous funding plus a $100 million increase appropriated for 2004. As a result of the increased funding, the AmeriCorps program was able to engage 25,000 more corps members.

In 2003, Khazei helped organize the "Save AmeriCorps" campaign that testified before Congress for more than 108 straight hours and succeeded in persuading Congress to restore funding for the AmeriCorps program, of which Khazei's organization CityYear is a part. He served from 1990 to 1992 as Vice-Chair of the Commission on National and Community Service upon appointment by President George H. W. Bush. From 2012-2015, he served as the co-chair of the Leadership Council of the Franklin Project, a policy program of the Aspen Institute that sought to make a year of service a common opportunity and expectation for young Americans.

In 1988 Khazei and his then–Harvard roommate Michael Brown founded City Year, a non-profit organization that offers 17- to 24-year-olds the opportunity to engage in 10 months of full-time community service. Khazei and Brown envisioned that a year of national service could become a commonplace bridge between high school and college.

Alan Khazei is the son of an Iranian-American surgeon and an Italian-American nurse. He was born in Pittsburgh and grew up in the Boston area and in Bedford, New Hampshire. In 1979, he graduated from St. Paul's School in Concord, New Hampshire, where he was president of his graduating class. He graduated from Harvard College with honors in 1983 and in 1987 from Harvard Law School with honors, where he was a member of the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau.

Alan Khazei (born May 28, 1961) is an American social entrepreneur. He founded Democracy Entrepreneurs, which promotes new change agents who are inventing new ways to engage people in our democracy, and Be the Change, Inc., a Boston-based group dedicated to building national coalitions of non-profit organizations and citizens that promoted advancing issues of national service, fighting poverty and empowering veterans. Previously, he served as chief executive officer of City Year, an AmeriCorps national service program engaging 17- to 24-year-olds in a year of service in one of 29 U.S. cities and in Johannesburg, South Africa and the United Kingdom. Khazei co-founded City Year with Michael Brown, his friend and roommate at Harvard College and Harvard Law School.