NEW YORK, NY.- Skyhorse Publishing, which has built a reputation for taking on books other houses consider too controversial to publish, has signed a deal to buy Regnery Publishing, a conservative press that has published politicians and media personalities including former President Donald Trump, Sen. Rand Paul and Ann Coulter.

Tony Lyons, president and publisher of Skyhorse, said the addition of Regnery bolstered his aim of publishing across the political spectrum.

“I’d like Skyhorse to be the preeminent free speech publishing company that publishes on all sides, so I think this is a great combination,” he said. “Regnery is the best-known conservative publishing company in America, and I think we can do things for them that they weren’t able to do for themselves.”

Skyhorse, although much smaller than the country’s biggest publishing houses, such as Penguin Random House and Simon & Schuster, is large for an independent publisher, with over 10,000 titles in print. It has garnered attention in recent years for taking on books that have been dropped by other companies because of scandal or public backlash.

Skyhorse acquired a biography of Philip Roth in 2021 after accusations surfaced against its author of sexual assault and misconduct, and the book was dropped by W.W. Norton. The year before, Skyhorse had picked up Woody Allen’s memoir, “Apropos of Nothing,” after its publication was canceled by Hachette. The book went on to become a New York Times bestseller.

Skyhorse has also sparked controversy by publishing books by figures who espouse theories that are outside the mainstream altogether, including Alex Jones, a conspiracy broadcaster whose recent book examines “the global elite’s international conspiracy to enslave humanity and all life on the planet.”

Lyons said he is “looking for a broad array of books that contradict each other.” Last year, Skyhorse released two versions of the Jan. 6 report, one with a foreword by a former speechwriter for Trump, the other introduced by a former Democratic congresswoman.

Regnery, on the other hand, has a distinctly conservative bent. Founded in 1947 by Henry Regnery, the company carved out a niche in the publishing landscape, which tends to skew to the left politically, by publishing conservative politicians and authors including Sen. Ted Cruz, Sen. Mitt Romney and former President Ronald Reagan, along with Christian titles, children’s books and fiction.




In a statement, David Evans, chief operating officer of Salem Media Group, Regnery’s parent company, said he believed Skyhorse “will both be a powerful steward of this important brand and an engine for its future growth.”

Regnery, which has projected sales of $10 million for 2023, will become an imprint of Skyhorse, and its 1,548 titles will be absorbed into the Skyhorse Publishing catalog. Skyhorse and Salem Media are not disclosing the terms of the sale.

Lyons said one of his aims is to get more conservative titles into bookstores. “Independent bookstores don’t carry most conservative books, but I think that stores ought to carry books that are provocative and dangerous and disturbing and that encourage dialogue and debate,” he said.

The addition of Regnery gives Skyhorse a much bigger footprint and greater clout in the conservative publishing sphere.

Lyons said that he doesn’t plan to add more liberal titles or add a left-leaning imprint because he feels the mainstream publishing marketplace is already saturated with those views.

“It’s a side of the argument that’s better represented in publishing,” he said.

Skyhorse has 20 imprints that publish a range of titles. Its catalog cuts across genres, including science fiction and fantasy novels, thrillers, cookbooks, books about sports and a pocket edition of the U.S. Constitution.

A small number of its books, however, gather outsize interest. Its bestselling book is by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — “The Real Anthony Fauci: Bill Gates, Big Pharma, and the Global War on Democracy and Public Health,” which was released in 2021 and makes baseless claims against Fauci. It has sold around 1.3 million copies. Kennedy is now a candidate for president and Lyons is co-chair of a super political action committee that supports him.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.