Ruben Navarrette, Jr., nationally syndicated columnist with the Washington Post and former Fresno State lecturer, will lead a forum titled “The Trumping of American Politics: What Now?” from 6:30-8 p.m., Thursday, Sept. 14, in the Satellite Student Union at Fresno State.

The free public event is presented by The Institute for Leadership and Public Policy in the College of Social Sciences and will be moderated by alumnus Joe Moore, “Valley Edition” host.

Navarrette will be joined by Patti Solis-Doyle, American political operative and senior adviser to the presidential campaign of Barack Obama in 2008 who also worked on Hillary Clinton’s political campaign.

A San Joaquin Valley native who attended public schools in Sanger east of Fresno where his family has deep roots, Navarrette is now the most widely read Latino columnist in the country and is known for his unpredictability and provocative thinking, said Dr. Jeff Cummins, Fresno State political science professor who is coordinating the event for the institute. He is often a guest commentator on NPR Tell Me More and CNN.

“I think you’re going to get perspectives you might not have heard about on different issues facing our country,” Cummins said. “They’re going to talk about the impact of the Trump administration on our political system and talk about some of the issues that are in the news such as immigration reform and the Trump administration’s policy on immigrant students.”

In a column published yesterday, Navarrette writes, “The national dialogue over immigration remains the most dishonest debate in America. Politicians in both parties routinely lie to their constituents.”

After graduating from Sanger High School, Navarrette graduated from Harvard and the Kennedy School of Government. In 1988-89, he took year leave from Harvard and enrolled in Chicano Studies classes at Fresno State. After Harvard, he taught in Fresno State’s Chicano/Latino Studies Department in the fall, 1990.

His first book, “A Darker Shade of Crimson: Odyssey of a Harvard Chicano,” was published to favorable reviews by Bantam Books in 1993, when the author was just 26 years old. In 2000, his essay “Vindication” portrayed the difficulties encountered in attempting to launch his writing career. It was selected from over 5,000 entries as one of the 101 contributions to “Chicken Soup for the Writer’s Soul,” an installment of the best-selling “Chicken Soup for the Soul” series.

Parking for Thursday’s forum is free with a special code available at bit.ly/COSS-NavarretteTalk.

For more information, contact Jeff Cummins at jcummins@csufresno.edu or Lucero Benitez at lbenitez@csufresno.edu.

Related links

Ruben Navarrette columns: http://www.sfchronicle.com/author/ruben-navarrette-jr/

Download Adobe Acrobat Reader