John Fonte

John Fonte is a senior fellow and director of the Center for American Common Culture at Hudson Institute.

Dr. Fonte is the author of Sovereignty or Submission: Will Americans Rule Themselves or Be Ruled by Others?, winner of the Intercollegiate Studies Institute’s Paolucci-Bagehot book award for 2012 and a number-one rated Amazon best-seller in international law. The book was published in Swedish in 2023

He is co-editor of Education for America’s Role in World Affairs, a book on civic and world affairs education used in universities and teacher training institutes.

Dr. Fonte’s articles and essays on citizenship, history, civic education, patriotism, assimilation, immigration, civil rights, global organizations, American sovereignty, and liberal democracy have appeared in Foreign Affairs, the Claremont Review of Books, The American Mind, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Commentary, Orbis, National Review, the National Interest, the American Interest, American Greatness, Policy Review, American Enterprise, Transaction, Academic Questions, American Legion Magazine,the Chicago Tribune,the Chicago Sun-Times,the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette,the San Diego Union-Tribune, LeFigaro (France), Nativ (Israel), Opinio (Netherlands), Perfiles Liberales (Mexico), Policy (Australia), Review (Australia), the Weekend Australian (Australia), and the National Post (Canada). 

He has also appeared on CNN, MSNBC, BBC, France 24, Voice of America, News Talk TV, Bloomberg, the Armstrong Williams Show, and numerous radio stations throughout the country, including National Public Radio.

Dr. Fonte was appointed by President Donald Trump and confirmed by the Senate to serve on the Council of the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) from 2019–21. He was on the foreign policy team of presidential candidate Newt Gingrich in 2012. Fonte has been a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute where he directed the Committee to Review National Standards. He also served as a senior researcher at the US Department of Education, and as program administrator at the National Endowment for the Humanities.  

Dr. Fonte has testified before Congress on immigration, assimilation, citizenship, citizenship naturalization, and civil rights issues. He has served as a consultant for the Texas Education Agency, the Virginia Department of Education, the California Academic Standards Commission, the American Federation of Teachers, and the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Lithuania. He was a member of the steering committee for the congressionally mandated National Assessment for Education Progress (NAEP) which issued the “nation’s report card” on civics and government.

He served as principal advisor for CIVITAS: A Framework for Civic Education funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts, and he was appointed by the general editor to write the chapter on The Federalist Papers. He has taught at the higher education and secondary school levels. He received his PhD in world history from the University of Chicago, and his MA and BA in history from the University of Arizona.