About the Speakers

Learn about the APSA 2023 Plenary Speakers and Presenters

The Debate over “National Conservatism”

Rogers Smith, University of Pennsylvania (moderator)

Carol M. Swain, Texas Public Policy Foundation

Charles Kesler, Claremont McKenna College

Saurabh Sharma, American Moment

Emily Jashinsky, The Federalist

Lucas E. Morel, Washington & Lee University

Rogers Smith, University of Pennsylvania (moderator)	Rogers M. Smith is the Christopher H. Browne Distinguished Emeritus Professor of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania, where he taught from 2001 to 2022. From 1980 to 2001 he taught at Yale University, ultimately as the Alfred Cowles Professor of Government. He is the author or co-author of many articles and eight books, including That Is Not Who We Are! (2020), Political Peoplehood: The Roles of Values, Interests, and Identities (2015), and Civic Ideals: Conflicting Visions of Citizenship in U.S. History (1997). Civic Ideals received six best book prizes and was a finalist for the 1998 Pulitzer Prize in History. Smith also received 5 teaching prizes from Yale and the University of Pennsylvania for both undergraduate and graduate teaching and mentoring. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2004, the American Academy of Political and Social Science in 2011, and the American Philosophical Society in 2016. He served as Associate Dean for Social Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania from 2014-2018, and as President of the American Political Science Association in 2018-2019.
Carol M. Swain, Texas Public Policy Foundation	Born into abject poverty in rural Virginia, Dr. Carol Swain earned five degrees and obtained early tenure at Princeton and full professorship at Vanderbilt where she was professor of political science and a professor of law. Today she is a sought after cable news contributor, prominent national speaker, and best-selling author. In addition to three Presidential appointments, Carol is a former Distinguished Senior Fellow for Constitutional Studies with the Texas Public Policy Foundation, having also served on the Tennessee Advisory Committee to the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the 1776 Commission. An award-winning political scientist, cited three times by the U.S. Supreme Court, she has authored or edited 11 published books and numerous opinion pieces for the major national publications. Her television appearances include BBC Radio and TV, CSPAN, ABC’s Headline News, CNN, Fox News, Newsmax and more. She is the founder and CEO of Carol Swain Enterprises, REAL Unity Training Solutions, Your Life Story for Descendants, and her non-profit, Be The People. Carol is a mother, grandmother, and great grandmother. She resides in Nashville, Tennessee.
Charles Kesler, Claremont McKenna College	Charles R. Kesler is editor of the Claremont Review of Books, a quarterly journal of political thought and statesmanship published by the Claremont Institute, where he is a senior fellow. Mr. Kesler is the Dengler-Dykema Distinguished Professor of Government at Claremont McKenna College, the author of several books, the most recent being Crisis of the Two Constitutions: The Rise, Decline, and Recovery of American Greatness. He has written extensively on American constitutionalism and political thought, and his edition of The Federalist Papers is the best-selling edition in the country. In 2017, Politico magazine named Kesler to its annual Politico 50 list and in 2018 the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation awarded him a Bradley Prize.
Saurabh Sharma, American Moment	Saurabh Sharma is a nationally recognized conservative activist and President of American Moment, the premier organization that identifies, educates, and credentials young Americans who will implement public policy that supports strong families, a sovereign nation, and prosperity for all. He is the co-host of American Moment’s podcast Moment of Truth, where he interviews leading business leaders, elected officials, public-policy leaders, intellectuals, journalists, and academics on the crises facing American society. He serves on the Conference Committee for National Conservatism Conference.
Emily Jashinsky, The Federalist	Emily Jashinsky is culture editor at The Federalist and host of Federalist Radio Hour. She previously covered politics as a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner. Prior to joining the Examiner, Emily was the spokeswoman for Young America’s Foundation. She’s interviewed leading politicians and entertainers and appeared regularly as a guest on major television news programs, including “Fox News Sunday,” “Media Buzz,” and “The McLaughlin Group.” Her work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Post, Real Clear Politics, and more. Emily also serves as director of the National Journalism Center, co-host of the weekly news show “Counter Points: Friday” and a visiting fellow at Independent Women’s Forum. Originally from Wisconsin, she is a graduate of George Washington University.
Lucas E. Morel, Washington & Lee University	Lucas Morel is the John K. Boardman, Jr. Professor of Politics and Head of the Politics Department at Washington and Lee University. He holds a Ph.D. in political science from Claremont Graduate University. He is the author of Lincoln and the American Founding and Lincoln’s Sacred Effort: Defining Religion’s Role in American Self-Government; editor of Lincoln and Liberty: Wisdom for the Ages and Ralph Ellison and the Raft of Hope: A Political Companion to Invisible Man; and co-editor of The New Territory: Ralph Ellison and the Twenty-First Century. Dr. Morel conducts high school teacher workshops for the Ashbrook Center, Jack Miller Center, Gilder-Lehrman Institute, Bill of Rights Institute, and Liberty Fund. He is a former president of the Abraham Lincoln Institute; a founding member of the Academic Freedom Alliance; a trustee of the Supreme Court Historical Society; a consultant for the Library of Congress and National Archives; and currently serves on the U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission, which will plan activities to commemorate the founding of the United States of America.

Mis- and Disinformation in an Age of Human Rights

Beth A. Simmons,
University of Pennsylvania (Chair)

Jack L. Snyder,
Columbia University

Suparna Chaudry,
Lewis & Clark College

Amanda Murdie,
University of Georgia

Kenneth Roth,
Princeton School of Public and International Affairs

Adela Levis,
Elliott School of International Affairs

Beth A. Simmons, University of Pennsylvania (Chair)	Beth Simmons is Andrea Mitchell Penn Integrates Knowledge University Professor of Law, Political Science and Business Ethics at the University of Pennsylvania. She is best known for her research on international political economy during the interwar years, global policy diffusion, and the influence that international law has on human rights outcomes. Two of her books, Who Adjusts? Domestic Sources of Foreign Economic Policy During the Interwar Years (2004) and Mobilizing for Human Rights: International Law in Domestic Politics (2009) won the American Political Science Association’s (previous entitled) Woodrow Wilson Award for the best book published in the United States on government, politics, or international affairs. The latter was also recognized by the American Society for International Law, the International Social Science Council and the International Studies Association as the best book of the year in 2010. Simmons is currently researching the paradox of hardening international borders between states in an era of globalization. She is a past president of the International Studies Association and has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences, the
Jack L. Snyder, Columbia University	Jack Snyder is the Robert and Renée Belfer Professor of International Relations in the political science department and the Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies at Columbia University. A Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, his books include Human Rights for Pragmatists: Social Power in Modern Times (Princeton University Press, 2022); Human Rights Futures (co-edited with Stephen Hopgood and Leslie Vinjamuri, Cambridge University Press, 2017); Ranking the World: Grading States as a Tool of Global Governance (co-editor with Alexander Cooley, Cambridge University Press, 2015); From Voting to Violence: Democratization and Nationalist Conflict (Norton Books, 2000; Chinese edition, Shanghai Press, 2017); Myths of Empire: Domestic Politics and International Ambition (Cornell University Press, 1991; Chinese edition, 2007). Recent articles and opinion pieces include “Why the Human Rights Movement Is Losing, and How It can Start Winning Again,” Foreign Affairs online, July 21, 2022; “The First Amendment Is Not a Suicide Pact,” American Purpose, February 22, 2021, “Backlash against Human Rights Shaming: Emotions in Groups,” International Theory 12:1 (2020):109-132; “The Broken Bargain: How Nationalism Came Back,” Foreign Affairs 98:2 (March/April 2019), 54-60.
Suparna Chaudry, Lewis & Clark College	Dr. Suparna Chaudhry an Assistant Professor of International Affairs at Lewis & Clark College and an Affiliated Scholar with the International Justice Lab at the College of William & Mary. Her research interests include human rights, international law, and political violence, with a focus on the causes and consequences of state persecution of NGOs and activists. She received the American Political Science Association’s (APSA) Human Rights Section’s award for Best Dissertation, as well as the International Studies Association’s (ISA) Best Human Rights Paper Award in 2018. Her work has been published in International Organization, Journal of Peace Research, Journal of Human Rights, Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, Global Policy, as well as The Washington Post.
Amanda Murdie, University of Georgia	Dr. Amanda Murdie is the Georgia Athletic Association Professor of International Affairs and Head of the Department of International Affairs. Dr. Murdie was the 2023 recipient of the Karl Deutsch Award from the International Studies Association. This award “is presented annually to a scholar who is judged to have made (through a body of publications) the most significant contribution to the study of International Relations and Peace Research.” A recent article identified her as one of the top five most productive researchers in the cross-disciplinary field of human rights from 1990 to 2020 (Severo et al. 2021). From 2018 through 2022, she was Editor-in-Chief of International Studies Review. She was also co-editor of the University of Georgia Press Studies in Security and International Affairs Book Series. Dr. Murdie studies International Relations, specializing in the behavior of international non-governmental organizations (INGOs) and their interactions with states, local populations, and intergovernmental organizations (IGOs). Most of her work is in the areas of human security, human rights, conflict processes, and development. She has published over eighty articles and book chapters in such journals as Journal of Politics, British Journal of Political Science, and International Organization. Dr. Murdie has worked with both the policy and the NGO communities to develop new quantitative measures that capture the power of human security INGOs and track the spread of human security norms among non-state actors. Before coming to UGA in 2016, Dr. Murdie was a professor at Kansas State University and the University of Missouri. Dr. Murdie was the 2011 winner of the William L. Stamey Award for Excellence in Teaching at Kansas State University. She has served on dozens of dissertation and thesis committees. Her students have gone on to faculty positions at many research and liberal arts colleges, including Murray State University, Georgia Southern, Rhodes College, and Emory University. They have also obtained jobs at many well-known think tanks, defense contractors, and NGOs, including the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism, Booz Allen Hamilton, RAND, and Doctors without Borders. In her spare time, Dr. Murdie enjoys hanging out with her spouse and college-aged daughters and hiking in the North Georgia Mountains. Her personal website is: amandamurdie.org
Kenneth Roth, Princeton School of Public and International Affairs	Kenneth Roth served for nearly three decades as the executive director of Human Rights Watch, one of the world’s leading international human rights organizations, which operates in some 100 countries. Before that, Roth was a federal prosecutor in New York and for the Iran-Contra investigation in Washington. A graduate of Yale Law School and Brown University, Roth has conducted numerous human rights investigative and advocacy missions around the world, meeting with dozens of heads of state and countless ministers. He is quoted widely in the media and has written hundreds of articles on a wide range of human rights issues, devoting special attention to the world’s most dire situations, the conduct of war, the foreign policies of the major powers, the work of the United Nations, and the global contest between autocracy and democracy. Roth is currently writing a book, Righting Wrongs, to be published by Knopf, about the strategies used by Human Rights Watch to defend human rights, drawing on his years of experience. Beginning in September 2023, he will be the Charles and Marie Robertson Visiting Professor at the Princeton School for Public and International Affairs.
Adela Levis, Elliott School of International Affairs	Dr. (des.) Adela Levis is the Academic & Think-Tank Liaison for the Global Engagement Center (GEC), at the U.S. Department of State. For the past seven years, she has been responsible for promoting and enabling research-driven counter-disinformation efforts across the organization, the US interagency, and with partner nation governments. She has been with the Department for twelve years, and in addition to her current role, she has served in the Bureau for Educational and Cultural Affairs, the Bureau for Populations, Refugees and Migration, and the Bureau for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor. Prior to joining the State Department, Dr. (des.) Levis worked as a German, French, and English languages instructor and in two humanitarian non-profits. She is originally from the former-Yugoslavia and has also lived in Germany, France, and Japan. Dr. (des.) Levis holds a B.A. in German and French from Oakland University, an M.A. in International Security and Communications from American University, and successfully defend her PhD dissertation in Political Science at the University of Munich on March 20, 2023. The dissertation examined the impact of authoritarian populist disinformation on democracy and the effectiveness of civic engagement for combating violent extremism.

The Supreme Court and the Future of Affirmative Action

Paula McClain, Duke University (moderator)

Janelle Wong, University of Maryland

Jonathan Feingold, Boston University School of Law

Richard Henry Sander, UCLA School of Law

Deondra Rose, Duke University

Michele Siqueiros, College Campaign

Ricardo Ramirez, University of Notre Dame

Paula McClain, Duke University (moderator)	Paula D. McClain is James B. Duke Distinguished Professor of Political Science and Professor of Public Policy and is the former Dean of The Graduate School and Vice Provost for Graduate Education (2012-2022). She moved to Duke from the University of Virginia in 2000. She also directs the American Political Science Association’s Ralph Bunche Summer Institute hosted by Duke University, and funded by the National Science Foundation and Duke University. A Howard University Ph.D., her primary research interests are in racial minority group politics, particularly inter-minority political and social competition, and urban politics. Her articles have appeared in numerous journals, most recently the Journal of Politics, American Political Science Review, Urban Affairs Review, The Du Bois Review: Social Science Research on Race and Politics, Groups and Identities, among others. Westview Press published the will publish the eighth edition of her book, “Can We All Get Along?” Racial and Ethnic Minorities in American Politics, with coauthor, Jessica D. Johnson Carew in early 2024. Her 1990 book, Race, Place and Risk: Black Homicide in Urban America, co-authored with Harold W. Rose, won the National Conference of Black Political Scientists’ 1995 Best Book Award for a previously published book that has made a substantial and continuing contribution. American Government in Black and White: Diversity and Democracy, co-authored with Steven Tauber, won the American Political Science Association’s Race, Ethnicity and Politics Organized Section Best Book Award for a book published in 2010. The 6th edition of the book was published in 2023. She is past president of the American Political Science Association, past president of the Midwest Political Science Association, and past president of the Southern Political Science Association and the National Conference of Black Political Scientists. She is a past vice president of the American Political Science Association, served as Program Co-Chair for the 1993 annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, served as Program Chair for the 1999 annual meeting of Midwest Political Science Association, served as Vice President of the Midwest Political Science Association, served as Vice President and 2002 Program Chair of the Southern Political Science Association, and served as a Vice President and Program Co-Chair of the 2003 International Political Science Association World Congress which was held in Durban, South Africa in July 2003. She is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Duke University Blue Ribbon Diversity Award (2012), the Graduate School Mentoring Award (2010), the Frank J. Goodnow Award for contributions to the profession of political science from the American Political Science Association (2007), a Meta Mentoring Award from the Women’s Caucus for Political Science of the American Political Science Association (2007), the Manning Dauer Award from the Southern Political Science Association (2015), and 2017 Midwest Women’s Caucus of Political Science (MWCPS) Outstanding Professional Achievement award. In 2014, she was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Publications include: – American Government in Black and White. 6th edition. Co-authored with Steven C. Tauber. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2023). – “Can We All Get Along?” Racial and Ethnic Minorities in American Politics, 8th edition. Co-authored with Jessica Johnson Carew. (forthcoming Boulder: Westview Press, 2024).
Janelle Wong, University of Maryland	Janelle Wong is Director of the Asian American Studies program in UGST. She is Professor of American Studies and Government and Politics at the University of Maryland. She is the co-author of several legal briefs that seek to provide social science insights, including from the field of Asian American Studies, on race-conscious admissions. Wong is co-author with Rossina Zamora Liu, William Liu, and Richard Shin of “Anti-Black Racism in Asian American Local Educational Activism: A Critical Race Discourse Analysis” (Education Researcher). With co-authors in law and education, she also wrote: “Mobilizing Social Science Research to Inform Judicial Decision-Making: SFFA v. Harvard” (Asian American Law Journal at Berkeley Law). As a scholar and teacher, Wong has worked closely with social service, labor, civil rights, and media organizations that serve the Asian American population.
Jonathan Feingold, Boston University School of Law	Jonathan Feingold is an associate professor at Boston University School of Law. Prof. Feingold’s scholarship explores the relationship between race, law, and the mind sciences. Much of his recent work asks how and why antidiscrimination law reinforces and reproduces racial hierarchy. Representative publications include SFFA v. Harvard: How Affirmative Action Myths Mask White Bonus, Reclaiming Equality: How Regressive Laws Can Advance Progressive Ends, and All (Poor) Lives Matter: How Class-Not-Race Logic Reinscribes Race and Class Privilege. Prof. Feingold hosts the #RaceClass podcast. Before joining BU Law, Prof. Feingold served as special assistant to the vice chancellor for equity, diversity & inclusion at the University of California, Los Angeles and was a research fellow in BruinX, a research and development team within the Office of Equity, Diversity & Inclusion. Prof. Feingold received his BA from Vassar College and holds a JD from UCLA School of Law, where he specialized in critical race studies.
Richard Henry Sander, UCLA School of Law	Richard Sander is an economist and law professor at UCLA, where he has taught since 1989 and where he serves as Director of the UCLA-RAND Center for Law and Public Policy. Most of his work draws on both law and social science to understand problems of social inequality and evaluate social policies. He is the author of two books: Moving Toward Integration (Harvard, 2018), which attempts to explain the complex evolution of housing segregation in America, the effects of fair housing laws, and the paths to desegregation; and Mismatch (Basic Books, 2012), which examines the paradoxical and often counterproductive effects of many current affirmative action policies in higher education, suggests a better path to diversity, and describes the barriers to reform. Sander also collaborates with judges and scholars to study innovative ways to simplify litigation and to evaluate the results of reforms – an approach that has gained a good deal of traction in recent years.
Deondra Rose, Duke University	Deondra Rose is the Kevin D. Gorter Associate Professor of Public Policy at Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy with secondary appointments in the departments of Political Science and History. She is also the Director of Polis: Center for Politics at Duke University. Her research focuses on U.S. higher education policy, political behavior, American political development, and the politics of inequality, particularly in relation to gender, race, and socioeconomic status. Rose is the author of Citizens By Degree: Higher Education Policy and the Changing Gender Dynamics of American Politics (Oxford University Press 2018), which examines the role that landmark federal higher education policies have played in the progress that women have made since the mid-twentieth century. Her new book project, The Power of Black Excellence: HBCUs and the Fight for American Democracy, examines the crucial role that historically Black colleges have played in American political development. A summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Georgia, Rose received her M.A. and Ph.D. in Government from Cornell University, with a specialization in American Politics and public policy.
Michele Siqueiros, College Campaign	Since its founding in 2004, Michele Siqueiros has been the driving force behind the Campaign for College Opportunity, a California based nonprofit policy advocacy and research organization committed to ensuring more students can go to college and succeed. Born and raised in Los Angeles, the daughter of a seamstress who then became the first in her family to go to college, Michele understands the transformative power of education and has dedicated her life to opening the doors of college opportunity. In her 19 years at the Campaign for College Opportunity (President since 2008), she has built a strong, independent, and influential organization by raising over $30 million dollars, assembling a team of experts and leaders in the field, championing major budget appropriations, securing historic higher education legislation, and establishing a broad and influential network of over 12,000 coalition supporters. Michele has a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Studies with Honors in Chicano/a Studies from Pitzer College and a Master of Arts in Urban Planning from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). She serves on the Boards of the California Endowment, Community Coalition, and is Vice Chair of the Pitzer College Board of Trustees. Michele is a member of the Trusteeship (the Southern California arm of the International Women’s Forum) and the LA Civic Alliance. In 2022, Michele was Co-Chair of the Latinos for Bass mayoral campaign. In 2020, Governor Newsom asked her to serve on the California Higher Education Recovery with Equity Taskforce. In 2019, she was appointed by Senate Pro Tem Leader Toni Atkins to the Student-Centered Funding Formula Oversight Committee. She previously served on the California Student Aid Commission as a gubernatorial appointee and on the Los Angeles Commission for Neighborhood Empowerment as a Mayor Villaraigosa appointee. She is Latina and fluent in English and Spanish. Michele believes in working toward a more just and equitable Los Angeles and California where every person – regardless of their zip code, race/ethnicity, or income – can reach their full potential.
Ricardo Ramirez, University of Notre Dame	Ricardo Ramirez is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame. He is the director of the Hesburgh Program in Public Service and a faculty fellow in the Institute for Latino Studies. He is past President of the Western Political Science Association (WPSA). He received his B.A., cum laude, from UCLA and his Ph.D. in Political Science from Stanford University. His broad research interests include political behavior, state and local politics, the politics of race and ethnicity, and immigrant politics. His research is geared to understanding the transformation of civic and political participation in American democracy by focusing on the effects of political context on participation, the political mobilization of and outreach to Latino immigrants and other minority groups, and the causes and consequences of increasing diversity among elected officials. His recent publications include Latinos and the 2016 Election: Latino Resistance and the Election of Donald Trump (Michigan State University Press 2020), Mobilizing Opportunities: The Evolving Latino Electorate and the Future of American Politics (University of Virginia Press 2013), “Unlinking fate? Discrimination, Group-consciousness, and Political Participation among Latinos and Whites,” “Selective Recruitment or Voter Neglect? Race, Place, and Voter Mobilization in 2016”

Examining CRT & DEI Mis(Dis)Information: The Intellectual, Policy, and Political Implications in the Academy and Beyond

Courtenay W. Daum, Colorado State University

Jessica L. Lavariega Monforti, California State University Channel Islands

Kaitlin Kelly Thompson, Tufts University

Loan K. Le, Institute for Good Government & Inclusion

Sergio C. Wals, University of Nebraska, Lincoln

Liz Norell, University of Mississippi

Isaac Kamola,
Trinity College

Periloux Peay, University of Oklahoma

Courtenay W. Daum, Colorado State University	Courtenay W. Daum is a Professor of Political Science at Colorado State University and an affiliate faculty member with the Center for Women’s Studies and Gender Research. Daum is an intersectional critical legal theorist and her research focuses on the interactions between law and society including LGBTQ politics, institutionalized white supremacy and feminist legal theories. Recent research includes The Politics of Right Sex: Transgressive Bodies, Governmentality and the Limits of Trans Rights (SUNY Press) and guest editing a special issue of the journal New Political Science on the American Constitution in Crisis including the introductory article “We the People and America’s Constitutional Crisis.
Jessica L. Lavariega Monforti, California State University Channel Islands	Jessica Lavariega Monforti is a Vice Provost at California State University, Channel Islands who supports the academic endeavors and development of faculty, students, and staff, and our institution. Dr. Lavariega Monforti believes that education can empower students and help them and others acknowledge their potential. Dr. Lavariega Monforti has landed nearly $10M in major grant funding, published 3 books and over 50 articles and book chapters, and contributed to several news articles and broadcasts including the New York Times, La Opinión, and NPR’s All Things Considered. Dr. Lavariega Monforti is an award-winning teacher, leader, and scholar, having received the MPSA Latino Caucus Distinguished Career Award, UT Regents’ Outstanding Teaching Award, Adaljiza Sosa-Riddell Award for Exemplary Mentoring of Latino/a Undergraduate Students in Political Science, various best research paper awards from major political science associations, as well as institutional leadership awards. She is a Ford Fellow, the founder and co-organizer of the biennial, national Women of Color in Political Science Workshop, and past president of the Western Political Science Association. Dr. Lavariega Monforti holds a PhD in Political Science from The Ohio State University, and is an alumna of WSCUC’s Accreditation Leadership Academy, ACAD Fellow Program, the HERS Institute and Berkeley’s Executive Leadership Academy.
Kaitlin Kelly Thompson, Tufts University	Kaitlin Kelly-Thompson is a lecturer at Tufts University. Their dissertation There is Power in a Plaza: Social Movements, Democracy, and Spatial Politics received the 2021 APSA Women and Politics best dissertation award. Their research focuses on social movements, inclusive solidarities, spatial justice, and deliberative democracy.
Loan K. Le, Institute for Good Government & Inclusion	Dr. Loan Le is President of the Institute for Good Government and Inclusion, a 501c3 public policy think tank. She is also Faculty Lecturer at San Francisco State University, specializing in Asian American lived experiences as well as racial, ethnic and gender incorporation and equal protection
Sergio C. Wals, University of Nebraska, Lincoln	Dr. Sergio Wals’ research interests are in the area of political behavior, including public opinion and political psychology. Given his training and background, he approaches the study of political behavior broadly, and pursues projects that can enlighten our understanding of this subfield of political science from both the American and the Comparative perspectives. Within the subfield of political behavior, he focuses on the relationship between democratization and individual perceptions of politics as well as on topics related to immigration, race and ethnicity both in the United States and in Latin America. By incorporating elements from all of his major areas of interest, he has offered an innovative approach both conceptually and methodologically to the study of Latino immigrants’ political engagement in the United States. Within this line of work, his research contributes to the vast literatures on political attitudes toward democratic institutions, political socialization, political participation, partisanship, ideology, and heuristics. Wals served as a Journey for Anti-Racism and Racial Equity Co-leader at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln from July 2020 to June of 2023. He has also served as General Secretary of the World Association for Public Opinion Research since August of 2015.
Liz Norell, University of Mississippi	Dr. Liz Norell is the Associate Director of Instructional Support at the University of Mississippi. In this role, she works with faculty from across the university in designing, executing, and sharing the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL). She holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of Texas Dallas, along with master’s degrees in journalism and library science. Her disciplinary research focuses on political ideology, particularly from a political psychology perspective; she’s passionate about understanding the antecedents of political polarization and efforts to mitigate those divisions. She serves on the Braver Angels Scholars Council, which aims to bring more academic voices into the work of bridging political divides in America. She also serves as Associate Editor of the journal To Improve the Academy, a publication of the POD Network that shares peer-reviewed research on teaching and learning. Dr. Norell’s book, The Present Professor, is forthcoming from West Virginia University Press’s series on teaching and learning in higher education. She lives in Oxford, Miss. and Monteagle, Tenn. with her partner, who teaches mathematics and computer science at the University of the South.
Isaac Kamola, Trinity College	Isaac Kamola is an associate professor of political science at Trinity College, Hartford, CT. He is author of Free Speech and Koch Money: Manufacturing a Campus Culture War (with Ralph Wilson, 2021) and Making the World Global: US Universities and the Production of the Global Imaginary (2019). He directs Faculty First Responders, a program that monitors right-wing attacks on academics and provides resources to help faculty members and administrators respond to manufactured outrage.
Periloux Peay, University of Oklahoma	Periloux Peay is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of African American Studies at the University of Maryland – College Park. His research examines how those from under-represented communities employ collective strategies to shape political processes and outcomes from within and outside political institutions in America. His broad research question results in two distinct yet complementary branches of questions. On one hand, he examines how underlying forces – like institutional and interpersonal marginalization, intraparty issue avoidance, tokenism, and the denial to vital policy information – have long constrained Black lawmakers’ ability to achieve substantive gains in Black-interest areas. He finds, in response to these conditions, the Congressional Black Caucus has transformed from a loosely-tied group of Black lawmakers to a cohesive caucus with tremendous leverage over legislative processes by leaning on a collective approach to reorienting legislative attention, strategically defining and re-defining policy problems and solutions, serving in key information brokerage positions, and building diverse and sizeable coalitions within the chamber. The second line of research examines the impetus, implications, and effectiveness of racial protests in modern America. Here, he examines the electoral and policy ramifications of the Black Lives Matter movement. He also studies state responsiveness and state-sponsored repression of the movement. This line of research is supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF) Build and Broaden Program. Personally, he is a native of Southeast Texas. He received his Ph.D. from The University of Oklahoma in 2020. Prior to my enrollment in graduate studies, he spent 7 years working in secondary education in the Houston metropolitan area.

Generative AI and the Future of Political Science

Julie George, Cornell University (moderator)

Joshua A. Goldstein, Georgetown University

Filippo Trevisan, American University

Nicole Wu, University of Toronto

Baobao Zhang, Cornell University

Todd C. Helmus, RAND Corporation

Michael R. Tomz, Stanford University

Julie George, Cornell University (moderator)	Julie George is a predoctoral fellow at the Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI) and Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) at Stanford University, and a PhD Candidate in the Government Department at Cornell University, specializing in international security. In her dissertation project, she investigates the likelihood of proliferation of three dual-use emerging technologies: artificial intelligence, robotics, and cyber. Previously, Julie was a Summer Associate Fellow at RAND’s National Security Research Division (2020) and Project Air Force (2021). Prior to her PhD studies at Cornell University, she worked at the Atlantic Council and completed a graduate fellowship at the Nonproliferation Education and Research Center (NEREC) housed at KAIST University in South Korea. For more information on her research, please check out her website.
Joshua A. Goldstein, Georgetown University	Josh A. Goldstein is a Research Fellow at Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET), where he works on the CyberAI Project. Prior to joining CSET, he was a pre- and postdoctoral fellow at the Stanford Internet Observatory. His research has included investigating covert influence operations on social media platforms, studying the effects of foreign interference on democratic societies, and exploring how emerging technologies—like large language models—will impact the future of propaganda campaigns. He holds an MPhil and DPhil in International Relations from the University of Oxford, where he studied as a Clarendon Scholar, and an A.B. in Government from Harvard College.
Filippo Trevisan, American University	Filippo Trevisan is Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs and Associate Professor in the School of Communication at American University in Washington, D.C. He is also the chair of APSA’s Information Technology and Politics (ITP) Section and serves as the deputy director of AU’s Institute on Disability and Public Policy (IDPP). His work explores the intersection of technology, advocacy, activism, and political communication, with a particular focus on traditionally under-represented and politically marginalized voices. He is the author of Disability Rights Advocacy Online: Voice, Empowerment and Global Connectivity (Routledge, 2017) and his work has been published, among others, in New Media & Society, the Journal of Communication, Social Media + Society, and the Journal of Information Technology and Politics. His next book explores political storytelling in the context of crowdsourcing, datafication, and AI. He has appeared, among others, in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the BBC, Al-Jazeera, Germany’s ZDF, and RAI-Radiotelevisione Italiana.
Nicole Wu, University of Toronto	Nicole Wu is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Toronto. Her research in comparative and international political economy focuses on how individuals, labor groups, and firms respond to technological change and automation in the workplace. She was previously a postdoctoral fellow at the Niehaus Center for Globalization and Governance at Princeton University and received her PhD in Political Science from the University of Michigan.
Baobao Zhang, Cornell University	Baobao Zhang is the assistant professor of Political Science at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. She is a Schmidt Futures AI2050 Early Career Research Fellow and a research affiliate with the Centre for the Governance of AI. Her current research focuses on trust in digital technology and the governance of artificial intelligence (AI). I study (1) public and elite opinion toward AI, (2) how the American welfare state could adapt to the increasing automation of labor, and (3) attitudes toward Covid-19 surveillance technology. Her previous research covered a wide range of topics, including the politics of the U.S. welfare state, attitudes towards climate change, and survey methodology. She graduated with a PhD in political science (2020) and an MA in statistics (2015) from Yale University. In 2020-2021, she worked as a Klarman Postdoctoral Fellow in the Cornell Society of Fellows. In 2019-2020, she worked as a postdoctoral fellow in MIT’s Political Science Department and a fellow at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University.
Todd C. Helmus, RAND Corporation	Todd Helmus is a senior behavioral scientist at the RAND Corporation and a nationally recognized expert on disinformation and violent extremism. He specializes in the use of data and evidence-based strategies to understand and counter disinformation and extremist threats. He has led studies examining the disinformation threat posed by deepfakes, Russian-led propaganda campaigns targeting the United States and Europe, and the use of social media by violent extremist groups. He has also led research on the effectiveness of online interventions to prevent radicalization. In addition to his research, Helmus is a frequent speaker at security conferences. He has served as a consultant to the U.S. Departments of Defense, State, and Homeland Security and has served as a deployed analyst to U.S. military commands in Iraq and Afghanistan. His work has been featured in various media outlets including the New York Times, National Public Radio, the Financial Times, The Atlantic, Harpers Magazine, Forbes and MSNBC. Helmus holds a Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Wayne State University, Detroit, MI.
Michael R. Tomz, Stanford University	Michael Tomz is the William Bennett Munro Professor in Political Science and Chair of the Department of Political Science at Stanford University. He is also a Senior Fellow at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, a Senior Fellow at the Stanford King Center on Global Development, and the Landreth Family University Fellow in Undergraduate Education. Tomz has published in the fields of international relations, American politics, comparative politics, and statistical methods. He is the author of Reputation and International Cooperation: Sovereign Debt across Three Centuries and numerous articles in political science and economics journals. Tomz received the International Studies Association’s Karl Deutsch Award, given to a scholar who, within 10 years of earning a Ph.D., has made the most significant contribution to the study of international relations. He has also won the Giovanni Sartori Award for the best book developing or applying qualitative methods; the Jack L. Walker Award for the best article on Political Organizations and Parties; the best paper award from the APSA section on Elections, Public Opinion and Voting Behavior; the best paper award from the APSA section on Experimental Research; and the Okidata Best Research Software Award. His research has been supported by the National Science Foundation.