Free CUNY Graduate Center Event: American Scoundrel with Kai Bird, Susan Goldmark & Ken Auletta

The CUNY Graduate Center Office of Public Programs 

Wednesday, September 23, 6:30 p.m.

American Scoundrel: Roy Cohn’s Dark Journey from Joe McCarthy to Donald Trump

Kai Bird and Susan Goldmark in Conversation with Ken Auletta

The CUNY Graduate Center, 365 Fifth Ave.

Elebash Recital Hall

FREE; in-person or online reservations required at: ​​https://www.gc.cuny.edu/public-programs

From Kai Bird, Pulitzer Prize-winning co-author of American Prometheus (inspiration for the movie Oppenheimer), comes this biography of lawyer and political fixer Roy Cohn. Cohn was a player in a startling number of history-shaping events — he was chief counsel to Senator Joseph McCarthy during the “Red Scare,” a legal hired gun for Mafia bosses, and an informal adviser to Richard Nixon. Perhaps most consequentially, he mentored the young Donald Trump, who emulated Cohn’s style and philosophies. Years after his death from AIDS-related complications, Cohn was depicted as a main character in Tony Kushner’s play Angels in America. Bird and co-author Susan Goldmark, chief researcher on the project, speak about the new book and Cohn’s continuing influence with Ken Auletta, author of bestselling books and longtime writer of the Annals of Communication for The New Yorker.

Presented with the Leon Levy Center for Biography.

A video of this event will be posted later on the CUNY Graduate Center’s YouTube Channel.