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[Please consider making a generous, tax-deductible contribution to the David Horowitz Freedom Center to help continue David’s mission far into the future: HERE.]
I learned of the death of David Horowitz in Colorado at age 86 a few days after it happened on April 29th, 2025.
A college friend of mine warned me that he didn’t like reading obituaries that were about the person doing the writing instead of the person who died, and I worried would happen which kept me from writing about David immediately. But now I don’t care about that. So here goes: my attempt to give one person’s perspective on David’s passing. Others might have other points-of-view.
It has taken me a while to write about it because so many different thoughts and feelings occurred since. I was conflicted because David was a complicated person to work for, something I did from 1992 to 1996. After I left his employ, he was nice to me in his autobiography, for which I am grateful.
David was ill for years fighting cancer that had spread, but since he seemed a born fighter, I never thought that it would lick him. I guess it didn’t occur that he was mortal, since he seemed like a force of nature, or even a supernatural being possessed of extra-terrestrial energy sources. I had never known someone with such energy and determination. While I was fighting writer’s block, David was always writing on his laptop, even in the doctor’s waiting room where I ran into him when taking my father for a checkup. He wrote on planes, in lobbies, everywhere and anywhere. In addition to his own writing, David simultaneously ran a publishing and activism empire, maintained a grueling schedule of public speaking and fundraising, and somehow had enough time left over to get married four times and father four children. When he died, it was reported that he had written fifty books. He had lived the lives of two, three, maybe even four men…
I read David’s Destructive Generation (co-authored with Peter Collier) after it came out and was affected by what he had written. I still think it is his best book. His description of Leftist nihilism is something obviously true but that I hadn’t noticed until David pointed it out.
Destruction is the aim of the enterprise. All the rest is just window dressing. Not only is the issue never the issue for the Left, as David repeatedly declared, The Revolution isn’t really the issue either–the issue is just destruction of all that exists, to return to a Year Zero…in other words the goal is nothingness.
I visited David in 2017 at his home in Simi Valley in order to congratulate him on the election of Donald Trump as President, since he had worked hard to make it happen. When I arrived, David handed me a signed copy of Big Agenda: President Trump’s Plan to Save America, his blueprint for the Trump administration. At the time, David was recovering from an operation and was walking with a limp. He seemed frail, but full of energy and determination.
David told me he was working on several projects simultaneously and handed me a copy of the latest volume of his 7-volume series, The Black Book of the American Left, detailing the horrors of the communists in America. But that wasn’t all.
He spoke at length about his wife April’s charity work with injured horses, for which he was proud to have help establish a charity foundation. He then took me outside, on a tour of their corral to introduced me to their horses.
That was a side of David that I hadn’t seen much during the years I worked for him–gentle, compassionate, and seemingly at peace. I had no idea that he was an animal lover. He also talked about his ex-wife and children, of who he was also extremely fond. Again, I hadn’t seen the paterfamilias side of David before, only the crusader side. It was not long before David moved to Colorado.
We talked on the phone a couple of times after that, and exchanged a few emails, but I never saw David again.
I did think about him a lot over the years, and came to the conclusion that his conversion to anti-communism was sincere. He was a best-selling author whose establishment career ended when he announced his support for President Reagan. His departure from the Left cost him not only friends, but also career opportunities. David told me that he never got a good review in the New York Times after publication of “Lefties for Reagan” in the Washington Post in 1985. His political heresy cost him millions in royalties, I’m sure.
And I have no doubt that the murder of his friend Betty Van Patter by the Black Panthers launched him on the political trajectory which changed his life. He was obviously surprised that his old comrades and liberal friends sided with the Panthers and excused the murder of his bookkeeper for political reasons.
In microcosm, David had personally experienced the history of Liberals, Socialists and Communists making excuses for murderous Communism since the October Revolution in Russia. No crime has been too horrible to be excused by those who remain devoted to the shining future promised by scientific socialists. Of course, David had been one of those Leftists himself, a “New Leftist” raised by “Old Leftist” parents. Old wine in a new bottle. As he wrote in his autobiography, he thought nothing of his parents hiding an East German spy in their family home. How different was that from families who hid members of the Weather Underground in the 1960s? Not very.
Although murder had been well-established as a feature of communist regimes by the 1960s, it was only when such a murder struck close to home, to someone he knew, that David realized the nature of the forces he had been aiding as editor of Ramparts and fund-raiser for the Black Panthers.
Nevertheless, despite his political heterodoxy, David was loyal to his friends. His collaborator Peter Collier was like a brother, perhaps even a twin separated at birth. After Collier died, ending their writing partnership, David became more of an organization man, building up The David Horowitz Freedom Center into an institution which he planned to outlive him. Luckily for David’s legacy, President Trump was re-elected in 2024. David had lived long enough to see vindication.
In conclusion, David Horowitz was a human being. Like any man, he had his flaws, and he made mistakes. Once he realized the errors of his youth, caused both by a communist upbringing and the trends of the 1960s, David fought the good fight. Not perfectly, but doggedly, with determination and persistence. With his last ounce of dying strength, he was writing until the end. And he lived long enough to see Donald Trump return to the Oval Office.
He finished the race. He kept the faith.
*
Laurence Jarvik is an author, thinker and scholar who worked for the Heritage Foundation and the David Horowitz Freedom Center when it was known as the Center for the Study of Popular Culture. An unedited original of this piece was first published at Laurence Jarvik Online here. All photos by Laurence Jarvik.
anyone who has done their homework knows that marx was a nihilist . his goal was destruction for the sake of it . america is on the same trajectory with the democrats leading the charge . they all hope that their end isnt like robespierres . as v.d. hanson asked , why ? marx provides the answer .
I am quite saddened at David Horowitz’s passing. He was a real great commentator on Fox News, too. His “Hating Whitey” with such bang up phrases as “kitsch Marxism” is something I try to incorporate in my writings. Also, his explanation of Marxism with Marx’s obnoxious habit of ascribing human conditions to inhuman forces was valuable for my understanding of that blood thirsty philosophy.
Incidentally, I was brainwashed into Leftist thought at a young age. I was propagandized by my brother into this antiwar stuff during the Vietnam war. We even had copies of “:Ramparts Magazine” at home. The lack of patriotism of the antiwar movement and its preaching of defeatism for America eventually turned me off to Lefty thought. Horowitz made a similar journey.
I do miss his voice on the tv scene.
I never thought being anti-Vietnam was was unpatriotic – hells bells what’s going down in Ukraine with the money laundering keeping the war going just for that is what kept Vietnam war going and the Iraq war and Afghanistan – everyone on all sides making a bundle – just keep it going – we’ll be fine – your sons and husbands, and brothers, cousins and friends maybe in peril and perished but we’ll be fine – hells bells again, wanting not to get involved in Vietnam is one of the many reasons and many assassination conspirators in the JFK coup d’etat assassination by the very thing that outgoing President Eisenhower warned us of: “The military industrial and today add technological complex.
JFK was killed by Oswald only — a lone radical (probably borderline personality) hard Leftist. Period. No LBJ, no military-industrial complex. Kennedy was reckless and (sadly) paid the price. Vincent Bugliosi’s book ‘Reclaiming History’ ends these silly conspiracy theories (famed prosecutor and author of Helter Skelter – Manson killings, which he prosecuted)..
I have read so much information that anyone who thinks Oswald was that talented a marksman is totally dead wrong.
kitsch Marxism – well kitschy – and highly accurate –
My brother and I also had copies of Ramparts at home. Had a change of mind, needless to say.
I came late to the party only coming across FP Mag after the genocide slaughter in Israel 10-7-2023.
Truth is all I seek to maintain focus and truth is hard to come by even with all this non stop chatter over the internet internationally around the clock – but it’s possible – our intuition is our best friend and our intuition connected to YHVH’S Holy Spirit is impossible to beat with enough experience.
People grow up. Mature. Idealism gives way to reality, Things don’t add up. Then before one knows it, the liberal is seeing the conservative side is more abundant, richer, healthier and better air.
I think how many times even the Bible gives examples of being conservative or on the right side – even Yeshua Messiah Lord Jesus Christ taught fiscal abundance is on the right. And being on the right is exactly what Yeshua/Jesus was teaching:
John 21:6 And He said to them, “Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some.” So they cast, and now they were not able to draw it in because of the multitude of fish.
Radical Son is still one of the greatest things I have ever read, in part because I read it at a time of questioning my own youthful, naive beliefs, and losing some good friends along the way. What David went through makes my experience seem slight, however. I emailed him a thank you for having written Radical Son, and he was gracious enough to respond. I still have a printout of his email in my copy of the book.
Amen and dittos – I was so impressed by how Horowitz, who was so invested in leftism personally and professionally, had the courage and integrity to walk away. “Unholy Alliance” is also very good.
Destructive Generation is an essential book.
What a wonderful tribute to a man I came to admire over these many years. My intro to David & Frontpage Mag was by accident. It was one of the best accidents I’ve had since learning more about a party I was born into but came to despise was warranted. I read Leftist Illusions. & had so many questions to ask of him. He would email me back within days which was so thoughtful of him to do. Radical Son was another favorite.. I’ve read many of his books and came to understand how the left operated & just how far their dastardly tentacles spread. We are far from perfect but what a wonderful man David Horowitz had been. & his many lectures were insightful. I will miss him dearly. & hope he is at peace now. Goodbye Mr. H. May God bless you.