Leonard Zeskind

Leonard Harold Zeskind (November 14, 1949 – April 15, 2025) was an American human rights activist. He was president of the Institute for Research and Education of Human Rights (IREHR), a social justice and public affairs watchdog organization.

Background

Leonard Harold Zeskind was born in Baltimore, Maryland on November 14, 1949, and grew up mostly in Miami, Florida. He enrolled at the University of Miami and the University of Kansas, but did not earn a degree. He was expelled from the University of Kansas for participating in protests against the Reserve Officers' Training Corps during the Vietnam War. For thirteen years prior to his concentration on human rights, he worked in industry, including stints on an automobile assembly line, installing refrigerator motors in vending machines, and as a welder and first-class fitter in steel fabrication plants.

Career

Zeskind became a community activist and human rights advocate. He led the Center for Democratic Renewal from 1985 to 1994. He was known for his research into extreme right, racist, and antisemitic organizations in the United States. In 1998, he was an honoree of the MacArthur Fellows Program. The Institute for Research and Education of Human Rights served as a resource about such groups and their members when information about them rose dramatically following the January 6 United States Capitol attack.

He was a lifetime member of the NAACP. He also served on the board of directors of the Petra Foundation and the Kansas City Jewish Community Relations Bureau.

Zeskind wrote the 2009 book '' Blood and Politics'', about the history of xenophobia and white nationalism in American politics. ''The New York Times'' noted his thesis that such views were only growing more mainstream was met with some skepticism at the time, but the book was viewed as increasingly prescient in the years to follow, particularly after the 2017 Unite the Right rally and similar events. In 2025, the book was among those removed from the library of the United States Naval Academy as part of the U.S. Department of Defense censorship of DEI-connected material.

Personal life and death

After a marriage to Elaine Cantrell ended in divorce, Zeskind married Carol Smith. He died from pancreatic cancer at his home in Kansas City, Missouri, on April 15, 2025, at the age of 75.

Awards

* 1998 MacArthur Fellows Program
* 1992 Petra Foundation Fellowship

Works

*
''Blood and Politics: The History of White Nationalism from the Margins to the Mainstream''
Macmillan, 2009,

References

External links

Author's website

"Leonard Zeskind: Blood and Politics"
''Open Source Audio''

"Right-Wing Extremism Expert Leonard Zeskind Analyzes the Movement That Nurtures Shooters Like Von Brunn and Roeder"
''Buzzflash'', November 6, 2009


''Everyday Citizen'', Stuart Elliott, March 19, 2008


Leonard talks with Bob DiCello on the legal news talk radio program, Real Law Radio, about the infiltration of the Tea Party Movement by white supremacists (Podcasts/Saturday March 27, 2010).

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zeskind, Leonard
1949 births
2025 deaths
20th-century American Jews
20th-century American journalists
20th-century American male writers
20th-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American Jews
21st-century American journalists
21st-century American male writers
21st-century American non-fiction writers
American community activists
American human rights activists
American male journalists
American male non-fiction writers
Deaths from cancer in Missouri
Jewish American community activists
Jewish American journalists
Jewish American non-fiction writers
MacArthur Fellows
Writers from Miami
Journalists from Miami
Writers from Baltimore
Deaths from pancreatic cancer in the United States
Writers from Kansas City, Missouri
Welders