Marc Thiessen

Marc Thiessen is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) where he studies and writes about American presidential leadership and counterterrorism. He also writes about general US foreign and defense policy issues and contributes to the AEIdeas blog.

A member of the White House senior staff under President George W. Bush, Thiessen served as chief speechwriter to the president and to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. Before joining the Bush administration, Thiessen spent more than six years as spokesman and senior policy adviser to Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms (R-NC).

A biweekly columnist for The Washington Post, Thiessen is also a contributor to Fox News, appearing regularly on "The Story with Martha MacCallum," "America's Newsroom," and other programs. His book on the Central Intelligence Agency's interrogation program, "Courting Disaster" (Regnery Press, 2010), is a New York Times bestseller. Thiessen is also the coauthor, with Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, of "Unintimidated" (Sentinel, 2013).

Thiessen has done postgraduate studies at the Naval War College and has a B.A. from Vassar College.