Leah Wright Rigueur

Leah Wright Rigueur is an author, historian, speaker, and SNF Agora Institute Associate Professor of History at the Johns Hopkins University. She is an expert in race and politics, US political and social history, African American politics and history, and riots and American backlash, and holds a Ph.D. in History from Princeton University. Previously, she was a professor at the Harvard Kennedy School.

Leah is the author of The Loneliness of the Black Republican: Pragmatic Politics and the Pursuit of Power (2015), a book that offers a much-needed critical examination of the tense relationship that exists between African Americans and the GOP. Providing a thorough reading of black voting behavior and opinion over a 60-year period, Leah’s book also analyzes the ideas and actions of black activists, politicians, officials, and intellectuals that worked with and within the Republican Party. In doing so, Leah provides a new understanding of black politics and American politics, and the tortured intersection of civil rights and conservatism.

At the Harvard Kennedy School, Leah taught courses on race, riot and backlash in the US; the civil rights movement and current racial and social justice movements; and race, politics, policy and history. She also led Race and American Politics, a multidisciplinary series of seminars and roundtables dedicated to the most pressing political and social issues related to race in the United States, including presidential politics, mass incarceration, immigration, economic justice, and voting rights.

Leah’s writing, research and commentary has been featured in a number of different outlets including The New York Times, The Washington Post, CBS News, MSNBC, PBS, NPR, and CNN. She is located in Cambridge, MA and Hartford, CT.

Sub-specialties: Race; American politics; United States history; African American history; black voters; black vote; black Republicans; the Republican Party; black Democrats; political ideology; American political parties; the American presidency; riots; backlash; urban disorder; campus unrest; black politicians; civil rights; social justice movements; black women and the GOP; black women and conservatism.