After NBC, Nykanen served as the Press Secretary for California Governor Jerry Brown’s 1992 campaign for the Democratic nomination for President.
[4] One of his first prominent news investigations was into the Arizona State Prison Complex – Florence, where his undercover work saw him banned from the facility,[2] and his articles clipped from newspapers before they were distributed to the inmates, in an attempt to suppress his discoveries.
In September, 1982, he began working on a documentary uncovering an international ring of child pornography and prostitution that spanned from Holland and Denmark to the American Midwest.
The documentary was aired nationwide on NBC as an hour-long special under the title Silent Shame: The Sexual Abuse of Children.
[4] In 2020, Nykanen began hosting and producing XRTV-Victoria, a half-hour monthly show that examines the climate crisis with news and science about the emergency.
It has also provided behind-the-scenes coverage of logging road blockades to save ancient trees in the renowned Fairy Creek watershed on Vancouver Island, British Columbia.
The work began as a short story based upon a nightmare he had while suffering from a fever, which his literary agent encouraged him to turn into a novel.
[26] In 2009, he released the novel Primitive, the story of a middle-aged model who is kidnapped by eco-renegades and held captive in their secluded compound.
[27] In 2011, he published Striking Back, about a serial killer who murders members of a therapist's spousal abuse support group.
[28] The same year, under the pseudonym "James Jaros", Nykanen published the post-apocalyptic novel Burn Down the Sky, based on a world decimated by climate change and a killer virus.
[28] In 2012, he released the novel Carry the Flame under the same pen name, which follows the story of a caravan of people braving a scorched American Midwest populated by roving bands of violent outlaws.