Kevin J. McMahon

Kevin J. McMahon is the John R. Reitemeyer Professor of Political Science. His research examines the presidency and the political origins and consequences of Supreme Court decisions. In 2014, the Supreme Court Historical Society awarded his book, Nixon's Court: His Challenge to Judicial Liberalism and Its Political Consequences (University of Chicago Press, 2011), its Erwin N. Griswold Book Prize. The Society only awards the Griswold Prize occasionally, approximately every three or four years. Nixon's Court was also selected as a 2012 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title. Professor McMahon's first book, Reconsidering Roosevelt on Race: How the Presidency Paved the Road to Brown (University of Chicago Press, 2004), won the American Political Science Association’s Richard E. Neustadt Award for the best book published that year on the American presidency. He is also the co-author/co-editor of three books on the presidency and presidential elections and author of numerous book chapters and journal articles.

Before earning his PhD at Brandeis University in 1997, Professor McMahon taught for two years in Russia with the Civic Education Project (a.k.a., the “academic Peace Corps”). Before arriving at Trinity, he taught at the State University of New York, Fredonia, where he was honored with the Hagan “Young” Scholar Award. In 2006, he was a Fulbright Distinguished Research Chair at the University of Montreal. In the classroom, his teaching style is Socratic in spirit, driven by a philosophy that students perform best when they are asked to actively participate in their own learning.