Christopher Rufo

Christopher Rufo is a right-wing operative who is responsible for the rise of “critical race theory” as a GOP talking point. He has played a central role in the attacks against diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) practices, as well as attacks against gender-affirming healthcare. Rufo has even claimed that public schools are often “hunting grounds for sexual predators.”

Rufo is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute (MI), which was co-launched in 1978 by Antony Fisher, who also helped launch other right-wing groups, such as the Atlas Economic Research Foundation. In 2022, MI had more than $20 million in revenue, including $450,000 from Leonard Leo’s The 85 Fund. MI has been at the forefront of attacks on DEI efforts through Rufo’s work, in addition to backing an array of racial dog whistles like stoking fears about crime. MI’s trustees include billionaire Paul Singer, who flew Justice Sam Alito to a luxury trip for salmon fishing in Alaska, and Kathy Crow, the wife of billionaire Harlan Crow, a benefactor of Justice Clarence Thomas who has provided Thomas and his wife with numerous luxurious trips.

Rufo is also a “distinguished fellow” at Hillsdale College, a Project 2025 Advisory Board member whose flagship publication, Imprimis, that has published pieces like the “January 6th Insurrection Hoax.” Hillsdale is also known as the place targeting the privatization of K-12 education, which Rufo has also attacked, saying for example that “To get to universal school choice, you really need to operate from a premise of universal public school distrust.”

Rufo was previously a fellow at the Discovery Institute, a Christian non-profit that rejects evolution and has denied the scientific consensus on climate change. Rufo was also a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, the group spearheading Project 2025.

In 2020, Rufo appeared on Tucker Carlson’s FOX program where he called on then president Donald Trump to issue an executive order against “critical race theory.” Shortly after, Trump issued an executive order banning federal contractors from conducting racial and gender sensitivity trainings.

More recently, after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis took over the board of trustees at Florida’s New College, a historically inclusive and progressive college, he appointed Rufo and other right-wing operatives. The new board fired the college’s president, replaced the board president with a DeSantis appointee, and did away with its diversity initiatives. Rufo and the board are also in the process of eliminating the Gender Studies department.

Rufo has written essays where he contended that U.S. “conservatives” should look to authoritarian Hungary and Richard Nixon as models for a “counter-revolution” against the left. He has stated, “if we can just create questions in the public discourse about Nixon and about Nixon’s presidency — then I think, by way of analogy, it will provoke similar questions about Donald Trump.”

Rufo also made headlines when a Houston-based surgeon, Ethan Haim was indicted for allegedly stealing transgender minors’ medical information and shared those private records with Christopher Rufo, who has sought to block the rights of transgender Americans.