Research Overview
On October 2, 2020, the Lake County, Florida Supervisor of Elections (SoE) Alan Hayes posted the following message on the jurisdiction’s official SoE Facebook page:“Please share! We were just notified of some misinformation that is being communicated at some social media sites regarding voting by mail. It is NOT true that if you fail to sign your vote-by-mail ballot itself, your ballot will not be counted. You are only REQUIRED to sign the return envelope. That signature is compared with your signature on file to verify your ballot.” With this post, Hayes was correcting misinformation about one of the most polarized voting methods during the 2020 U.S. elections—voting by mail. He was also performing a key function as a local election official: informing voters about the vote methods under Florida state law, and telling them how they could cast a mail ballot.
Local election officials like Alan Hayes are a part of a broader network of political actors I call the “intermediaries of democracy”, the institutions and individuals connecting the laws that govern American elections to the electorate. Alongside election officials, these intermediaries include poll workers, and political campaigns and party organizations. I study the effects of voting laws on voter behavior and over time developments in American elections. More precisely, I examine how the intermediaries of democracy filter and refract these laws, moderating their effects and generating unintended consequences. The central claim underlying my research is that we cannot fully understand the effects of voting laws without also understanding the role played by those delivering those laws—whether through the communication and implementation of laws in the case of election officials and poll workers, or strategic adaptation to these laws in the case of campaigns and party organizations.
By studying how intermediaries of democracy shape the effects of voting laws in the United States, my published and ongoing research deepens our understanding of the relationship between the laws that govern voting, the intermediaries that interpret and respond to those laws, and the American public. My goal for this research is to not only generate new perspectives on American democracy through academic scholarship, but to also use my expertise to support the work of the election officials who engage in voter education and outreach. I hope to support them in the development of practical solutions for voter education and to the rising threat of election mis- and dis-information.