
Henry Olsen
Senior Fellow
Henry Olsen, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, studies and provides commentary on American politics. His work focuses on how America’s political order is being upended by populist challenges, from the left and the right. He also studies populism’s impact in other democracies in the developed world.
For media inquiries or to book Mr. Olsen for an interview, contact [email protected].
Click here to view a full archive of Mr. Olsen’s writings.
Henry Olsen, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, studies and provides commentary on American politics. His work focuses on how America’s political order is being upended by populist challenges, from the left and the right. He also studies populism’s impact in other democracies in the developed world.
From 2019–2023, Mr. Olsen was an opinion columnist for The Washington Post, where he wrote daily pieces focusing on politics, populism, foreign affairs and American conservative thought. He is also the author of The Working Class Republican: Ronald Reagan and the Return of Blue-Collar Conservatism and The Four Faces of the Republican Party, co-authored with Dante Scala.
Mr. Olsen taught as the Thomas W. Smith Distinguished Scholar-in-Residence at Arizona State University for the Winter/Spring 2023 semester. He has taught at Villanova University, the Catholic University of America, and the Hillsdale College D.C. Graduate Studies Program.
Mr. Olsen was previously an editor at UnHerd.com and a regular contributor to American Greatness, City Journal, and World Magazine. Mr. Olsen’s work has been featured in many prominent publications, including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, National Review, The Guardian, and The Weekly Standard.
His predictions of the 2008, 2010, 2012, 2014, 2016, and 2018 elections were particularly praised for their remarkable accuracy. In the 2016 campaign, he accurately identified the factors fueling the rise of Donald Trump early in the race, and his election-eve predictions were among the most accurate of any major analyst or commentator.
Mr. Olsen has worked in senior executive positions at many center-right think tanks. He most recently served from 2006 to 2013 as Vice President and Director, National Research Initiative, at the American Enterprise Institute. He previously worked as Vice President of Programs at the Manhattan Institute and President of the Commonwealth Foundation.
Mr. Olsen started his career as a political consultant at the California firm of Hoffenblum-Mollrich. He then worked with the California State Assembly Republican Caucus before attending law school. He served as a law clerk to the Honorable Danny J. Boggs on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit and as an associate at Dechert, Price & Rhoads. He has a B.A. from Claremont McKenna College and a J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School, where he served as Comment Editor for the University of Chicago Law Review.
Gaslighting Themselves: Why Trump Critics Miss the Obvious
Henry Olsen
It’s not just that President Trump’s opponents find him odious at best and dangerous at worst: it’s that they have little to no sense of why people might disagree with them and why the president’s ultimate demise is far from the smug certainty they assume it is.
Articles
American Greatness / May 30, 2018
Republicans’ Millennial Problem Isn’t What You Think
Henry Olsen
Republicans who want to modernize their party rightly point to the GOP’s weakness among millennials as a target area for improvement. But the prescription will only work if the diagnosis is correct.
Articles
City Journal / May 29, 2018
The Trump Coalition and the Electoral College
Henry Olsen
Demographic change means that Republicans and non-progressives must act now if they do not want to cede political control to the Left.
Articles
American Greatness / May 20, 2018
Eyes on the Primaries
Henry Olsen
The real campaign season is kicking off now, and what happens in the spring and summer often determines who wins in the fall.
Articles
World Magazine / May 11, 2018
Have Special Elections Warped Our Sense of the Midterms?
Henry Olsen
The “blue tsunami” scenario could yet come to pass, but consideration of all the evidence provides a glimmer of hope for Republicans in November’s midterms.
Articles
The New York Times / May 3, 2018
A Tax Cut Worthy of a Worker’s GOP
Henry Olsen
Americans worry that the massive windfalls from cuts secured for corporations will simply go to their shareholders or be shipped overseas. A new tax cut bill should include a provision that encourages businesses to hire American workers.
Articles
American Greatness / May 2, 2018
Mr. Ryan Leaves Washington
Henry Olsen
Paul Ryan is what we often say we want from our elected officials: a man of public and personal virtue. We must, therefore, seek to explain why his departure is seen as a tacit admission of failure.
Articles
City Journal / April 20, 2018
The Speech Trump Should Give on Cinco de Mayo
Henry Olsen
Much as Abraham Lincoln succeeded by appropriating the founder of the Democratic Party, Thomas Jefferson, to his cause, so too must Donald Trump interpret the symbols of those who currently feel hostility to him if he is to win.
Articles
American Greatness / April 20, 2018
Badger State Blues
Henry Olsen
The outcome of Wisconsin’s recent Supreme Court race has reignited talk that November will see a Democratic landslide. The evidence from that race, while good news for Democrats, is more nuanced.
Articles
World Magazine / April 12, 2018
Can ‘Reluctant Trump’ Voters Rescue the G.O.P.?
Henry Olsen
With Democrats winning in normally deep red places like Alabama and Pennsylvania’s 18th Congressional District, it looks like a blue wave is swelling for the midterm elections. There’s still time for Republicans to change that, but first they must figure out how to mount an effective defense.
Articles
The New York Times / April 4, 2018
A Time for Choosing
Henry Olsen
If the voter base of the conservative movement no longer supports the small-government, open-to-the-world policies that so many leading critics of President Trump back, what are the critics to do? More important, what should be the movement’s response to this dissatisfaction?
Articles
National Review - April 2, 2018 issue / March 30, 2018
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