Kathryn Olmsted is the author of Right Out of California:The Struggle for Labor Rights and the Making of Modern Politics published by The New Press. Kirkus wrote, “Olmsted . . . finds in Depression-era California the crucible for strong-arm policies against farm workers that bolstered the conservative movement.”
Her other books include Challenging the Secret Government: The Post-Watergate Investigations of the CIA and FBI which examines conservatives’ use of anticommunist rhetoric to undermine efforts to reform intelligence agencies in the 1970s. Real Enemies: Conspiracy Theories and American Democracy, World War I to 9/11 investigates the influence of anticommunist conspiracy theorists both inside and outside of government throughout the twentieth century.
Kathy is the chair of the history department at the University of California, Davis, where she has taught classes in twentieth-century American history for twenty years. An expert on conspiracy theories, her commentary appears often in the press, from the New York Times Magazine to The Nation, Salon.com and the Associated Press. She is interviewed frequently by media in the US and overseas, and has written articles for print and on line publications.
Kathy is the author of The Newspaper Axis: Six Press Barons Who Enabled Hitler, about the conservative media moguls who hindered America and Britain from entering World War II. It will be released in 2022.