Clay Risen is a reporter at The New York Times and the author of several books on American history, including, most recently, Red Scare: Blacklists, McCarthyism and the Making of Modern America (2025), which was named a best book of the year by The New Yorker, The Boston Globe and the Chicago Tribune. He also writes frequently on the history of American whiskey, both for The Times and in books like American Whiskey, Bourbon and Rye: A Guide to the Nation's Favorite Spirit. He is a member of the Society of American Historians. A graduate of the Georgetown School of Foreign Service and the University of Chicago, he lives with his family in Brooklyn.