1. David Jeffrey Frum is a Canadian-American political commentator and a former speechwriter for President George W Bush.
46 Facts About David Frum
1. 2.
David Frum is a senior editor at The Atlantic as well as an MSNBC contributor.
3.
In 2003, Frum authored the first book about Bush's presidency written by a former member of the administration.
4.
David Frum has taken credit for the famous phrase "axis of evil" in Bush's 2002 State of the Union address, and he is considered a voice in the neoconservative movement.
5.
David Frum formerly served on the board of directors of the Republican Jewish Coalition, the British think tank Policy Exchange, the anti-drug policy group Smart Approaches to Marijuana, and as vice chairman and an associate fellow of the R Street Institute.
6.
David Frum is the son of Canadian journalist Barbara Frum.
7.
David Frum's sister, Linda David Frum, was a member of the Senate of Canada.
8.
David Frum has an adopted brother, Matthew, from whom he is estranged.
9.
David Frum is married to the writer Danielle Crittenden, the stepdaughter of former Toronto Sun editor Peter Worthington.
10.
David Frum is a distant cousin of economist Paul Krugman.
11.
At age 14, David Frum was a campaign volunteer for an Ontario New Democratic Party candidate Jan Dukszta for the 1975 provincial election.
12.
David Frum was educated at Yale University, where he took the Directed Studies program.
13.
David Frum worked as a regular contributor for National Public Radio.
14.
David Frum filed for naturalization and took the oath of citizenship on September 11,2007.
15.
David Frum served as special assistant to the president for economic speechwriting from January 2001 to February 2002.
16.
David Frum is credited by his wife with inventing the expression "Axis of Evil", which Bush introduced in his 2002 State of the Union address.
17.
David Frum later acknowledged that it remains unclear how the US "could have delivered better success in Iraq" in terms of replacing Saddam with a "more humane and peaceful" government.
18.
Commentator Robert Novak, appearing on CNN, claimed that David Frum was dismissed because his wife had emailed friends, saying that her husband had invented the "axis of evil" phrase.
19.
David Frum opposed the nomination of Harriet Miers for the Supreme Court of the United States, on the grounds that she was insufficiently qualified for the post, as well as insufficiently conservative.
20.
Shortly after leaving the White House, David Frum took up a position as a fellow of the American Enterprise Institute, a neoconservative think tank.
21.
David Frum's position lasted from 2003 until March 25,2010, when his paid position was terminated and he declined to accept the offer of a non-paying position.
22.
David Frum later stated that he was asked to leave AEI because of his vocal criticism of the Republican party's no-holds-barred opposition to Obamacare.
23.
On October 11,2007, David Frum announced on his blog that he was joining Rudolph Giuliani's presidential campaign as a senior foreign policy adviser.
24.
On November 16,2008, The New York Times reported that David Frum would be leaving National Review, where he was a contributing editor and online blogger.
25.
David Frum announced to readers of his blog that he would be starting a new political website, NewMajority.
26.
David Frum joined The Atlantic as a senior editor in March 2014.
27.
On November 6,2024, David Frum announced that he had left the Republican Party following Donald Trump's victory in the 2024 United States presidential election.
28.
In January 2003 Frum released The Right Man: The Surprise Presidency of George W Bush, the first insider account of the Bush presidency.
29.
David Frum published Comeback: Conservatism That Can Win Again in 2008.
30.
In 2018, David Frum published Trumpocracy: The Corruption of the American Republic, about the dangers posed by the Trump presidency to American democracy.
31.
David Frum was interviewed for the book on the New Books Network.
32.
David Frum was a commentator for American Public Media's "Marketplace" from 2007 until his final appearance on October 12,2011.
33.
David Frum helped write George W Bush's famous "Axis of Evil" speech to describe the governments of Iraq, Iran and North Korea.
34.
In 2010, David Frum was involved in the formation of the centrist group No Labels as a "founding leader".
35.
David Frum specifically urged the commissioning of a surgeon general's report on firearms health effects on individual ownership, and he called for Senate hearings regarding the practices of firearms manufacturers.
36.
David Frum compared these to hearings conducted in the 1990s about tobacco companies.
37.
In 2014, David Frum accused Edward Snowden of collaboration with Vladimir Putin's television networks.
38.
David Frum appeared on stage with Steve Bannon, Trump's former campaign CEO and White House Chief Strategist, in the November 2,2018 edition of the Munk Debates in Toronto, ON.
39.
David Frum is a proponent of immigration reform, arguing that "reducing immigration, and selecting immigrants more carefully" would lead to increased economic benefits and restore "the feeling of belonging to one united nation, responsible for the care and flourishing of all its people".
40.
David Frum expressed support for Israel and its right to self-defense during the Gaza war.
41.
In December 2023, David Frum said that the Israeli response was "inevitable" and that Palestinian statehood was not the solution.
42.
David Frum supported John McCain in the 2008 presidential election, writing "I vote for John McCain".
43.
David Frum had previously been a vocal critic of Republican presidential candidate McCain's choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate on the grounds that Palin was unqualified to assume the presidency.
44.
David Frum stated that he voted for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 US presidential election.
45.
David Frum is identified with the Never Trump movement, Republicans who opposed the election of Donald Trump and continued to oppose Trump during his presidency.
46.
In October 2019, David Frum called Trump "very, very guilty" of attempting to influence Ukraine to announce an investigation into Trump's political opponent Joe Biden.