Jeb Stuart Magruder was born on November 5, 1934 in New York City. Magruder became a household name during the Watergate scandal, which culminated in the resignation of President Richard M. Nixon. First a White House aide, Magruder became the deputy campaign manager of the Committee for the Re-election of the President (CRP). As the name implied, the Committee was ostensibly organized to raise funds for Nixon's 1970 re-election bid for the White House. In reality, the Committee existed largely to funnel large amounts of campaign money to illegal operations aimed at the Democrats. Magruder authorized some of the payments for these operations, including a payment to G. Gordon Liddy, a conspirator in the break-in of the Democratic National Committee Headquarters in the Watergate Hotel in Washington, D.C. It was this burglary that set in motion the Watergate scandal. Magruder compounded his difficulties by participating in the attempted cover-up of the illegalities.

After earning a master's degree in divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary, Magruder served as pastor for several churches over a number of years. He was then became a church-fundraising consultant. Magruder also wrote one of more than 70 books related to Watergate, and his An American Life became a bestseller.