Bio
I’m a fifth year Ph.D. candidate in the political science department at The University of California, Davis, where I research America’s democratic institutions. I’m primarily interested in Congress and elections, understanding the ways in which different kinds of political elites respond to democratic backsliding. I work with a wide range of datasets to answer these questions, including data on campaign contributions, lobbying, interest group position-taking, legislation, and campaign agendas. I have additional research interests in symbolic politics and political rhetoric surrounding American Civil Religion and nationalism. I also work as a Graduate Student Researcher at the Democracy Policy Lab at the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley, where I research voting rights and election law, and work on the State Voting Laws Roundup. Starting in Summer 2026, I will continue this work as a postdoctoral fellow in the Democracy Policy Lab.
Before starting my PhD, I worked for three years as a researcher at The Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, where I worked on issues including Electoral College reform and the Equal Rights Amendment. At the Brennan Center, I was also the lead research assistant and project manager on The People’s Constitution, a legal and political history of the United States Constitution and each amendment.
I was born and raised in Tucson, Arizona, and did my undergraduate degree at Occidental College in Los Angeles. In the years since, I lived in both New York City and Washington D.C., and now call Davis, California home. Outside of academia, I’m an avid board gamer, movie lover (follow me on Letterboxd), saxophonist, and cartoonist!
Education
Ph.D. in Political Science, expected 2026 | University of California, Davis
B.A. in Politics and Economics, 2018 | Occidental College
Research interests
American political institutions | Elite behavior | Congress and Legislatures | Democratic Backsliding | Election law