About Us

Our Purpose

Knowledge for a Competitive America (KCA) is a nonpartisan campaign to preserve, strengthen, and elevate essential federal science products and services that drive U.S. innovation and competitiveness in the aviation, aerospace, real estate, and agriculture industries. Working with a network of partners, KCA works to preserve, strengthen, and drive awareness of essential federal science and research investments that keep the U.S. competitive, prosperous, and secure.

Our Partners

Knowledge for a Competitive America elevates the importance of federally funded science to everyday Americans and the industries that sustain their daily lives. The campaign brings together a unique group of partners from the aviation, real estate, and agriculture sectors, as well as a diverse set of non-governmental organizations, to tell the important stories of how federal investments in science, research, and technology lead to measurable economic benefits across the U.S. Our growing set of partners include emergency and risk managers, innovators, insurers, and clean energy and manufacturing advocates.

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Our Leadership

Pamitha Weerasinghe

Campaign Director

Pamitha Weerasinghe is a science and earth system science policy expert with more than a decade of experience leading legislative advocacy, strategic policy development, and stakeholder engagement across federal, state, and private sectors. He proudly served on the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Science, Space, and Technology with a primary focus on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), earth sciences at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and research at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

In his capacity as Professional Staff, Pamitha was responsible for authorizing and evaluating programmatic efforts at these agencies as well as stewarding the legislative priorities of both the Committee ranking member and caucus, including the bi-partisan passage of the Weather Research and Forecasting Innovation Act of 2017, a landmark piece of legislation supporting the critical functions of NOAA, the National Weather Service, and the robust weather enterprise.

After leaving Congress, Pamitha has worked for national non-profits leading government relations strategies at both state and federal levels. He has also leveraged his subject matter expertise to support business development efforts in the aerospace industry. He continues to work with non-governmental entities and trade associations providing strategic guidance and thought leadership on a variety of projects.

At Knowledge for a Competitive America, he continues to work at the intersection of science and policy, leading partnership engagement across industry sectors and directing the execution of advocacy and communications strategies designed to elevate the importance of federal science programs.