Dr. Saladin Ambar Bio

Saladin Ambar joined the Eagleton Institute of Politics in 2017. Dr. Ambar is a

Senior Scholar at Eagleton’s Center on the American Governor and Professor of

Political Science at Rutgers University-New Brunswick. He is the author of six books,

including Stars and Shadows: The Politics of Interracial Friendship from Jefferson to

Obama (Oxford University Press 2022), which won the PROSE Award for Best Book

in Government and Politics from the Association of American Publishers in 2023. Prof.

Ambar’s Malcolm X at Oxford Union: Racial Politics in a Global Era (Oxford University

Press 2014) is currently in development for a feature length film, by Number 9 Films

(UK).

Dr. Ambar’s recently published book, Murder on the Mississippi:  The Shocking

Crimes that Shaped Abraham Lincoln (Diversion Books, 2025), offers a narrative

examination of a series of racially motivated lynchings and murders beginning in

1835, that haunted the young Abraham Lincoln and illuminated for him how

vulnerable America was to the rise of despotism. The events became a central focus

of Lincoln’s first major speech, the “Lyceum Address,” delivered in 1838.

Dr. Ambar’s research focuses on the institutions of the American presidency and

governorship, race and ethnic politics, American political thought, and American

political development. He is currently the New Jersey Social Justice Institute’s Director

of the Democracy Committee for the New Jersey Reparations Council. Prof. Ambar

also serves as scholarly advisor to the Lincoln Presidential Foundation and the

Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library and Museum.

Dr. Ambar has appeared as an expert commentator in several episodes of CNN’s

series “Race for the White House,” and has consulted for the Smithsonian Channel as

a fact-checker. He has been a regular guest on PBS New Jersey and New York’s

broadcasts of MetroFocus, offering political commentary, and his work has been

featured in numerous media outlets, including the Washington Post, CNN, Politico,

Newsweek, The Root, the Huffington Post, Literary Hub, the Daily News, and NJ

Spotlight.

Before his career in academia, Dr. Ambar taught in the New York City and New

Jersey public school systems for 18 years, beginning as a Teach For America recruit.

Prof. Am bar is a graduate of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service,

where he received his BS in International Politics; he received his MA in Political

Science from the New School for Social Research and completed his PhD in Political

Science at Rutgers University-New Brunswick. He has recently become a dual citizen

with Italy.  Dr. Ambar is the father of 17-year-old triplets, and he lives in Philadelphia

with his cats Orson and Oscar.