Dennis Prager | |
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.jpg) Prager in 2021 | |
| Born | (1948-08-02)August 2, 1948 (age 77) New York City, U.S. |
| Education | Brooklyn College (BA) Columbia University |
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| Website | dennisprager |
Dennis Mark Prager (/ˈpreɪɡər/; born August 2, 1948) is an Americanconservative radio talk show host and writer. He is the host of the nationally syndicated radio talk showThe Dennis Prager Show. In 2009, he co-foundedPragerU, which creates content advocatingcapitalism and promotingconservative viewpoints on various political, economic, and sociological topics.
His initial political work, starting in 1969, focused on theRefuseniks, Soviet Jews who were denied permission to emigrate.[1] He gradually began offering more and broader commentary on politics.
In November 2024, Prager became paralyzed from the neck down due to a fall.
Dennis Mark Prager was born on August 2, 1948,[2] in Brooklyn to Hilda (née Friedfeld; 1919–2009) and Max Prager (1918–2014), the latter the son ofPolish Jewish immigrants.[3] Prager and his brother,Kenneth Prager,[4] were raised in aModern Orthodox Jewish home. He attended theYeshiva of Flatbush inBrooklyn, New York, where he befriendedJoseph Telushkin.
Prager attendedBrooklyn College, where he double majored inanthropology andhistory, and received a B.A. in 1970.[2][5] He became a fellow at theColumbia University School of International and Public Affairs and attended there from 1970 to 1972, while he also took courses at theUniversity of Leeds.[2][5] After he left graduate school, Prager leftModern Orthodoxy but maintained many traditional Jewish practices; he remains religious.[2] Prager holds an honoraryDoctor of Laws fromPepperdine University.[6]
In 1969, while he was studying in England, he was recruited by the government of Israel to smuggle Jewish religious items into the Soviet Union and smuggle out names of Jews.[7] When he returned the next year, he was in demand as a speaker on repression ofSoviet Jews; he earned enough from lectures to travel, and visited around sixty countries.[1][8] He became the national spokesman for theStudent Struggle for Soviet Jewry.[9]
The start of Prager's career overlapped with a growing tendency amongAmerican Jews, who had been staunchly liberal, to move toward the center and some to the right, driven in part by the influx of Jews from the Soviet Union.[10] In 1975, Prager and Telushkin published an introduction to Judaism intended for nonobservant Jews:The Nine Questions People Ask About Judaism, which became a bestseller. Among the questions addressed in the text were: how doesJudaism differ fromChristianity, and can one doubt the existence ofGod and still be a good Jew, and how do you account for unethical but religious Jews?[2][11]
Prager ran theBrandeis-Bardin Institute from 1976 to 1983; Telushkin worked with him there.[2] It was Prager's first salaried job. He soon earned a reputation as a moral critic denouncingsecularism andnarcissism, both of which he said were destroying society; some people called him a JewishBilly Graham.[8]
In 1982,KABC (AM) inLos Angeles hired Prager to host its Sunday night religious talk showReligion on the Line,[1] which got top ratings[12] and eventually led to a weekday talk show.[13][14] He and Telushkin published another book in 1983,Why the Jews? The Reason for Antisemitism.[2]
According to a review inCommentary, the book depictsantisemitism as a "sinister form of flattery"; the authors wrote that hatred of Jews arises from resentment over Jews' acceptance of the doctrine that they are God's chosen people, charged with bringing a moral message to the world.[15] The book describes Jews as both anation (stateless for a long time) and followers of a religion. The authors write that this dual identity is essential to Judaism. The book also asserts that calls for Jews to culturally assimilate and opposeZionism are both forms of antisemitism.[15][16] The authors write thatsecular Jews are people who have lost their way, and who generally fall into the error of applying Judaism's mission to reform the world to ways that tend to be leftist, totalitarian, and destructive.[15][16]
He also wrote a syndicated column for newspapers across the country. In 1985, Prager launched his own quarterly journal,Ultimate Issues,[1] which was renamedThe Prager Perspective in 1996.[14]
In 1986, he divorced and underwent a year of therapy, which theEncyclopedia of Judaism says contributed to his 1999 bookHappiness Is a Serious Problem.[2] In 1990, he wrote an essay called "Judaism, Homosexuality and Civilization" that argued against normalizinghomosexuality in the Jewish community.[17] He regarded sexual sins on a continuum of seriousness ranging from premarital sex through celibacy, adultery, homosexuality and bestiality to incest. He argued that confining sex to heterosexual marriage desexualized religion. Desexualizing religion, according to Prager, was a great achievement of ancient Jewish tradition, an accomplishment worth fighting to retain.[18]
By 1992, he was remarried.[17] By that time he was, according to theLos Angeles Jewish Journal, a "fixture on local radio" and "a Jewish St. George battling the forces of secularity on behalf of simple 'goodness.'" He was generallysocially conservative, with some exceptions; he supported a woman's legal access to abortion (although he said it was usually immoral) and supported and justified sex between non-married consenting men and women.[17] In 1992, he became involved with theStephen S. Wise Temple and gave talks there.[2] He also began a weekday night talk show on KABC.[19]
In 1994, Prager also broadcast for an hour each weekday, via satellite onWABC, KABC's sister station in New York, before doing his KABC show locally.[20]
During the 1994–1995 television season,Multimedia Entertainment syndicated a show featuring Prager.[21][22] Prager said he was "ambivalent about television as a medium for deep, intelligent programming" but that the show was "an incredible opportunity to reach a mass audience with my belief system."[23] In 1995, he moved the studio audience on-stage with him where they could interact with him more directly.[24]
Prager supportedJimmy Carter in the1976 US presidential election.[25] In 1994, theAnti-Defamation League published a report on antisemitism in theChristian right movement; Prager, who aligned with the social and political conservatism of the Christian right, criticized the ADL and its report.[26] In 1995, he urged conservative Jews to be open to working with conservative Christians, like theChristian Coalition.[27] In 1995, he namedJacob Petuchowski,Eliezer Berkovits,Harold Kushner,C. S. Lewis,Richard John Neuhaus,Michael Novak, andGeorge Gilder as the people who had influenced his theology the most.[28]
In 1995, Prager criticized theIllinois Supreme Court decision in theBaby Richard case that removed a child from his adoptive parents.[29] With KABC he held a "Rally for Baby Richard,"[30] where he got support from actorsPriscilla Presley,Tom Selleck, andJohn McCook.[13]
In 1996, Prager testified in Congress in favor of theDefense of Marriage Act. Prager testified that "the acceptance of homosexuality as the equal of heterosexual marital love signifies the decline ofWestern civilization."[31][32] Prager worked withBob Dole's campaign in the1996 presidential election; when polls prior to the election showed that the Dole campaign did not have much Jewish support, Prager said this was because "American Jews are ignorant regarding theanti Israel aspects of the current Democrat Party."[33]
Since 1999, he has hosted a nationally syndicatedtalk show on the socially and politically conservativeChristian radio stationKRLA in Los Angeles.[2] KRLA is part of theSalem Media Group that carries other conservative hosts, includingJames Dobson,Randall Terry,Janet Parshall,Sebastian Gorka andLarry Elder. Salem is a key voice of theChristian right that seeks to change American politics as well as the way that individual people live.[34][35]
In 2006, Prager criticizedKeith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, for announcing that he woulduse the Quran for the reenactment of his swearing in ceremony. Prager wrote: "Insofar as a member of Congress taking an oath to serve America and uphold its values is concerned, America is interested in only one book, theBible. If you are incapable of taking an oath on that book, don't serve in Congress." In response, formerNew York City MayorEd Koch called for Prager to end his service on theUnited States Holocaust Memorial Museum Council.[36]
In 2009, Prager joined otherSalem Radio Network hosts to oppose theAffordable Care Act.[37] In 2014, whilesame-sex marriage in the United States was in the process of being nationally legalized, he wrote that if that were to happen, then "there is no plausible argument for denyingpolygamous relationships, or brothers and sisters, or parents and adult children, the right to marry."[38][39] In 2014, he also said that the "heterosexualAIDS" crisis was something "entirely manufactured by the Left."[39]
Prager endorsed Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election, but said that Trump was his "17th choice out of 17 candidates." He clarified that he "was not a Trump supporter, when there was a choice" but added, "There is no choice now."[40] Prager had previously said that Trump was "unfit to be a presidential candidate, let alone president."[41]Conor Friedersdorf ofThe Atlantic criticized Prager for endorsing Trump.[42]
In 2017, Prager was invited to be a guest conductor for the volunteer orchestra ofSanta Monica, California, as part of a fundraising concert at theWalt Disney Concert Hall. Some of the orchestra members protested the invitation, which they considered promoting bigotry. The orchestra leader, Guido Lamell, had invited Prager because he admired him, as Prager often discussed and promoted classical music on his shows and had guest-conducted a few times in the past, and because he thought Prager's presence might help raise more money.[39][38] Lamell called Prager "a great man, leader and friend."[43]
In April 2020, Prager called the COVID-19 lockdowns "the greatest mistake in the history of humanity."[44][45] His views were criticized inThe New York Times.[46] In a 2020 video called "'Follow the Science' Is a LIE," Prager toutedSweden's response to COVID-19 and said "Sweden is the proof that lockdowns are useless." A fact check in December 2020 found Prager's claim false, as Sweden had higher rates of COVID infection and mortality than other Scandinavian countries.[47]
In a November 2021Newsmax interview, Prager argued that "irrational fears" about people not vaccinated against COVID-19 had wrongly made them "the pariahs of America as I have not seen in my lifetime," more thangay men and intravenous drug users during theAIDS crisis, who he inaccurately said had not been ostracized.[48][49]The Independent called his comments "alarming revisionism."[48] In the interview, Prager also called concerns about climate change "idiotic" and "irrational."[48]
In 2009, Prager and his producerAllen Estrin started a website called PragerU. Despite what its name suggests, PragerU is not an academic institution, but rather creates videos on various topics from a conservative perspective.[50][51]BuzzFeed News described PragerU as "one of the biggest, most influential and yet least understood forces in online media." As of 2018[update] it spent around 40% of its annual $10 million budget on marketing; each video is produced according to a consistent style. Videos cover topics such as "racism, sexism, income inequality, gun ownership, Islam, immigration, Israel,police brutality" and speech on college campuses.BuzzFeed News wrote that "the biggest reason PragerU has escaped national attention is that it mostly doesn't do Trump," or engage with the political news cycle.[41] Some of its videos had viewer access restricted by YouTube in 2017.[52]
Prager speaks English, French, Russian and Hebrew.[53] His brother,Kenneth Prager, is a physician and professor atColumbia University Irving Medical Center.[4][54] His nephew,Joshua Prager, is a former writer forThe Wall Street Journal.[55] He and his second wife, Francine, adopted a son, Aaron Prager.[56] He also has another son,David Prager.[57]
In November 2024, Prager suffered a seriousspinal cord injury as the result of a fall that left him paralyzed below the shoulders.[58][59]
In 2018, Prager published a commentary on theBook of Exodus; this was followed by another commentary on theBook of Genesis in 2019. Both were published by the Salem Media Group.[11]
"Our nationally syndicated hosts — Bill Bennett, Mike Gallagher, Dennis Prager, Michael Medved and Hugh Hewitt — reach millions of Americans every week. I come to work every day thinking about how we can move those folks online to Townhall.com so they can voice their opinion through blogging, pod-casting and interacting with other conservatives." DeFeo is excited about the opportunities he has using Townhall.com and Salem's radio to reach members of the conservative movement and involve them in policy battles and political campaigns.
The videos are mini-lectures on topics from feminism to religion to foreign policy, presented from a conservative point of view.
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