D’Souza will be the featured speaker at Sixth Annual Public Affairs Distinguished Lecture Series, co-sponsored by the Associated Students of Washington State University Vancouver and the Thomas Foley Institute for Public Policy and Public Service.

He will speak at 7:30 p.m. April 9 on “The Crisis at Home and Abroad: Is Religion the Problem?”

D’Souza is the latest in a line of prominent speakers to deliver the annual WSU Vancouver lecture, which rotates between conservative and liberal speakers. Previous lecturers include former White House Chief of Staff John Sununu (2004), Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean (2005), former Attorney General John Ashcroft (2006) and investigative reporter Seymour Hersh (2007).

D’Souza, 46, was born in India and came to this country when he was 17, initially through a Rotary International program. He graduated from Dartmouth College in 1983 and later worked as a policy analyst in the Reagan administration.

D’Souza is best known for his volatile positions and his eight books, some of which have been New York Times best sellers.

D’Souza, in his 2007 book “The Enemy at Home,” wrote that “the cultural left and its allies in Congress, the media, Hollywood, the nonprofit sector and the universities are the primary cause of the volcano of anger toward America that is erupting from the Islamic world” and bears direct responsibility for the terrorist attacks that killed almost 3,000 people.

“The Enemy at Home” was widely panned by reviewers. Alan Wolfe, writing in The New York Times, opined that the book is “a national disgrace, a sorry example of a publishing culture more concerned with the sensational than the sensible.”

D’Souza also has taken contentious positions on gay and lesbians, African-Americans, affirmative action, feminism, religion and other issues.

And if liberals need any more reason to despise him, D’Souza years ago dated fellow conservative author Ann Coulter.