Thomas Frank

Thomas Carr Frank (born March 21, 1965) is an American political analyst, historian, and journalist. He co-founded and edited The Baffler magazine. Frank is the author of the book What's the Matter with Kansas? (2004) and Listen, Liberal (2016), among others. From 2008 to 2010, he wrote "The Tilting Yard," a column in The Wall Street Journal.

Frank analyzes trends in American electoral politics and propaganda, advertising, popular culture, mainstream journalism, and economics as a historian of culture and ideas. His topics include the rhetoric and impact of culture wars on American political life and the relationship between politics, economics, and culture in the United States.

Frank was born in Kansas City, Missouri, and grew up in Mission Hills, Kansas. He graduated from Shawnee Mission East High School and, in 1988, from the University of Virginia with a Bachelor of Arts degree in history after transferring from the University of Kansas in his freshman year. Frank received a Master of Arts degree in history in 1990 and a doctorate in history in 1994 from the University of Chicago. His doctoral thesis on advertising in the 1960s, The Conquest of Cool: Business Culture, Counterculture, and the Rise of Hip Consumerism, was later published by the University of Chicago Press.

Frank was a College Republican, attending campus meetings at the University of Kansas, but became highly critical of conservatism, especially the presidency of George W. Bush. Frank summarized the thesis of his book The Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Rule (2008) as "[b]ad government is the natural product of rule by those who believe the government is bad."

Frank's other writings include essays for Harper's Magazine, Le Monde diplomatique, Bookforum, and the Financial Times. His book What's the Matter with Kansas? (2004) earned him nationwide and international recognition. From December 2010 to February 2014, Frank wrote the monthly "Easy Chair" column for Harper's Magazine.

It received little attention at the time, but in Listen, Liberal: Or, What Ever Happened to the Party of the People? (2016), Frank was one of the few analysts who foresaw that Donald Trump could win the 2016 United States presidential election. In 2018, he called Trump "the worst politician ever" but maintained that Trump could be reelected in the 2020 presidential election. Frank further observes that "quasi-fascist movements" are springing up around the world.

Frank's research into U.S. populism was published in the book The People, No: A Brief History of Anti-Populism (2020). In it, he examines the term's origin in the United States and discusses historical examples of populism and its adherents and detractors.