Ann Coulter

Ann Hart Coulter (born 1961) is an American lawyer, columnist and political commentator who became one of the most visible voices in conservative media from the late 1990s. She writes in English, and her importance lies in having helped set the tone of conservative television and publishing debate in the United States.

She was born in New York City to a working-class family. Her father, of Irish and German Catholic descent, worked as an FBI agent, while her mother, whose ancestors included Puritan settlers of Plymouth Colony, was a homemaker. The family settled in New Canaan, Connecticut, where Coulter grew up with her two older brothers. She graduated from Cornell in 1984 and went on to study law at the University of Michigan. After clerking for a federal judge and practising in New York, she worked for a Senate Judiciary Committee staff, handling crime and immigration issues, before joining the Center for Individual Rights in Washington.

Her breakthrough came with her first book, High Crimes and Misdemeanors (1998), which argued for the impeachment of Bill Clinton and drew on her work writing legal material for Paula Jones's lawyers. Her blunt, openly partisan style became her trademark. She has said that she likes to stir things up and makes no claim to impartiality. She admired the playwright and politician Clare Boothe Luce for her satirical wit.

From 1996 she became a regular on television, first on MSNBC and later on CNN and Fox News, and she has appeared on programmes in the United States and Britain. Her syndicated column, distributed by Universal Press Syndicate, runs in newspapers and conservative websites. In 2001 the federal judge Richard Posner included her on a list of leading American public intellectuals, and in 2005 she appeared on the cover of Time. Her books have topped New York Times bestseller lists, and she has sold more than three million copies.

Her work has also been controversial. In 2001 a columnist accused her of plagiarism, and in 2006 another alleged that passages of Godless were borrowed, though her syndicate and publisher defended her. Her speaking events have drawn protests, and a few have been cancelled. Her positions, including support for federalism, opposition to abortion with exceptions, and the call to teach intelligent design alongside evolution, keep her at the centre of debate.

Her legacy lies mainly in her influence on conservative media argument. It has been suggested that her 2015 book Adios, America shaped Donald Trump's immigration rhetoric during the 2016 campaign, though this remains unconfirmed speculation. To her supporters she is a bold voice; to her critics, an example of inflammatory rhetoric. Either way, her career shows how controversy can become a successful publishing and television formula.