Experts available to discuss 2024 U.S. Presidential race
Topics include presidential campaigns, election issues, disinformation, election security, and more.
Virginia Tech has experts available to speak on topics surrounding the 2024 November Presidential election including the campaigns, issues such as abortion and climate changes, campaign finance, disinformation, election security, and more.
To schedule an interview, please contact mediarelations@vt.edu.
Expert: Karen Hult, chair of the Department of Political Science in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences
Topics: Nominations, party conventions, general election, candidate strategies relating to the Electoral College, impact of vice presidential candidates, third-party candidates, increasing importance of education and ideology in affecting vote choice, policy issues (immigration, inflation, climate change, crime, foreign affairs, etc.), concerns about ballot access, threats and security during elections, world views on election, impact money has on races
About: Hult teaches political science at Virginia Tech and serves as chair of its Center for Public Administration & Policy, with expertise in the U.S. Presidency, federal and state politics, policy, and governance, and federal and state courts. Watch interview here.
Expert: Caitlin Jewitt, associate professor in the Department of Political Science and the associate department chair in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences.
Topics: Nominations, presidential primary elections, presidential campaigns, electoral rules
About: Jewitt is the author of The Primary Rules: Parties, Voters, and Presidential Nominations (2019). She is particularly interested in the institutional features of elections and their effects on voters, outcomes, candidates, candidate strategy, and political elites. She has been featured in stories in The Washington Post, BBC, ABC News, USA Today, and MSNBC. She has also been a published columnist in The Los Angeles Times and MSNBC. Watch interview clip here.
Expert: Cayce Myers, professor of public relations and director of graduate studies at the School of Communication at the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences.
Topics: Campaigning in a polarized election, election disinformation, campaign finance, AI in political advertising, crisis communication during election, election surprises and chances of survival, election lawsuits
About: Myers’ areas of focus are media history, political communication, and laws that affect public relations practice. He is the author of Public Relations History: Theory Practice and Profession and Money in Politics: Campaign Fundraising in the 2020 Presidential Election. In addition to his public relations scholarship, Myers is accredited in public relations, and is active in several public relations and communication organizations. Watch interview clip here.
Expert: Jim Kuypers, professor in the School of Communication at the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences.
Topics: Political communication, strategic communication, rhetorical criticism, media bias, rhetorical framing analysis
About: Kuypers' research efforts are devoted primarily to exploring and understanding how professional politicians and citizens publicly address pressing social and cultural issues as these issues are relayed through the mediating lenses of the press. Kuypers is actively involved in exploring how public advocacy works in the digital age. Such work has resulted in offering courses such as Public Advocacy, Digital Advocacy Campaigns, and Professional Communication. Work in this area has applications across a wide variety of areas, including business relations, marketing, and public relations.
Expert: Justin Monday, assistant professor of practice in the Department of Business Information Technology at the Pamplin College of Business.
Topics: Election security
About: Monday is a former cybersecurity officer in the U.S. Air Force who now teaches an election security class at Virginia Tech. He retired as a commissioned officer after serving 20 years in the U.S. Air Force in the fields of Cyber Operations, Intelligence, and Security Forces.
Expert: Paul Avey, associate professor of political science in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences.
Topics: Nuclear politics, U.S. foreign policy
About: Avey was a 2018-2019 Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow based at the U.S. Department of Defense, serving as Advisor for Strategy in the office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy and Force Development. Before coming to Virginia Tech, Avey was a pre-doctoral fellow with the Managing the Atom project and International Security Program at Harvard’s Belfer Center for International Studies and a Stanton Nuclear Security Fellow at MIT. He is the author of Tempting Fate: Why Nonnuclear States Confront Nuclear Opponents and contributor of articles in International Security, Security Studies, International Studies Quarterly, Texas National Security Review, Journal of Global Security Studies, and Foreign Policy. Watch interview clip here.
Expert: Ariel Ahram, professor and chair of Government and International Affairs in the School of Public and International Affairs.
Topics: International Security & Terrorism, Environmental Security, Social Movements, Middle East politics
About: Ahram is an expert in international security, especially in the Middle East, and is currently serving as Primary Investigator on Escaping Proxy Wars in the Middle East, a $400,000 project funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York. He is the author of four books, including most recently War and Conflict in the Middle East and North Africa. Read interview here.
Expert: Liora Goldensher, assistant professor in the Department of Sociology at Virginia Tech and affiliated faculty with Women’s and Gender Studies and the Department of Science, Technology and Society in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences.
Topics: Women’s rights, specifically reproduction
About: Goldensher’s research focuses on reproduction, ethnography, medicine and health. Her work has appeared in Social Problems, the Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, and Synapsis.
Expert: Farida Jalalzai, associate dean for Global Initiatives and Engagement in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences and professor of political science.
Topics: Representation and behavior of women and minorities in politics, the role of gender in the political arena
About: In her role as associate dean, Jalazai is responsible for seeking to enhance the college’s robust international profile. She is the author of several books on global women’s rights and is frequently quoted and featured as an expert in outlets including The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The New York Times, and NPR. Watch interview clip here.
Expert: Rebecca Hester, associate professor in the Department of Science, Technology, and Society in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences.
Topics: Immigration, global health, Latin American migration
About: Hester’s research areas of focus examine contemporary accounts of “biological danger” and the social, political, and scientific implications of preempting, preventing, and eradicating such danger. Her courses at Virginia Tech include “The Foundations of Social Medicine” and “Monsters, Zombies, and Cyborgs.”
Expert: Jadrian Wooten, collegiate associate professor in the Department of Economics at the College of Science.
Topics: Economics, pedagogy, labor-related issues, international trade
About: His academic research focuses on teaching pedagogy as well as sports and other labor-related issues. He is committed to developing teaching resources for university and high school economics instructors and is most well known for his work on the integration of media into the economics curriculum. Wooten is the author of Parks and Recreation and Economics. He also writes a weekly newsletter, Monday Morning Economist. Watch interview clip here.
Expert: David Bieri, associate professor in the School of Public and International Affairs at the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences.
Topics: Economics, federal budget, federal/monetary policy
About: Bieri’s area of expertise is at the intersection of public finance, monetary theory, and history of economics. He has held various senior positions at the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland. Prior to his work in central banking, he worked in investment banking in London and Zurich. Watch interview clip here.
Expert: Cara Daggett, associate professor of political science in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences.
Topics: Climate and energy justice, fossil fuel development and politics in the U.S., anti-environmentalism of the far right, politics of energy transition
About: Daggett’s research explores the politics of energy and the environment in an era of planetary disruption. She is interested in questions that lie at the nexus of human well-being, science, technology, and the more-than-human world. Her work often draws upon feminist approaches to power in order to understand how global warming emerged, as well as how it might be mitigated. Daggett’s book, The Birth of Energy: Fossil Fuels, Thermodynamics, and the Politics of Work, was awarded the Clay Morgan Award for best book in environmental political theory. Read interview here.
Expert: Carol Franco, ecological economist and senior research associate with the Department of Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation in the College of Natural Resources and Environment.
Topics: Climate change impacts, climate change adaptation and mitigation policies, ecological economics, ecosystem services, transdisciplinary approaches.
About: Franco serves as part of the Dominican Republic delegation for the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and has been attending COP since 2012. COP has allowed negotiators, legislators, and observers from nearly every country in the world to come together to assess ways to address issues related to climate change. She took 7 students to the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Dubai in early December. Listen to interview here.
Expert: Craig Ramseyer, assistant professor with the Department of Geography in the College of Natural Resources and Environment.
Topics: Science behind climate change, climate change impacts on flooding, drought, tornadoes, hurricanes, etc., climate modeling, hydroclimatology, tropical climatology
About: Ramseyer’s primary area of research focuses on tropical rainfall, particularly in the Caribbean, and how climate change is likely to change drought and flooding. His other published research has examined weather impacts on football player mortality, climate change impacts on severe convective environments, and moisture impacts on Greenland ice melt. Watch interview here.
Expert: Matthew Fullen, associate professor of counselor education in the School of Education and affiliate faculty for the Virginia Tech Center for Gerontology. Topics: Medicare policy, behavioral health policy About: Fullen has worked with older adults since 2005, first in the affordable senior housing industry, and then as a licensed professional clinical counselor. He has worked as a mental health professional in diverse settings, including long-term care, adult day, and private practice contexts. Fullen's research focuses on developing and implementing counseling interventions that focus on wellness and resilience in older adulthood, expanding older adults' access to mental health services, specifically through expansion of Medicare-eligible services, and preventing suicide through community-based prevention frameworks. Read interview here. |
Expert: Nicholas Goedert, assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences.
Topics: Gerrymandering, American politics, legislative elections, election law, congress
About: Goedert’s research has been published in journals including the American Journal of Political Science, Legislative Studies Quarterly, Election Law Journal, and Research and Politics. He is the author of Ground War: Courts, Commissions, and the Fight over Partisan Gerrymanders from Oxford University Press. He served as an expert witness in the Wisconsin redistricting case Whitford v. Gill (adjudicated by the U.S. Supreme Court), and has also served on the executive board of UpVote Virginia and as a consultant for the advocacy group FairVote on election structure issues. Watch interview clip here.
Expert: Daniel Gibbs, assistant professor of political science and core faculty member at the Kellogg Center for Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at Virginia Tech.
Topics: Filibuster, political messaging (specifically from legislators), pandering, vetoes, policymaking in Congress
About: Gibbs’ research develops game-theoretic models to study collective decision-making and political accountability in democratic political institutions. His work examines how politicians’ individual electoral interests influence the policy decisions they make collectively and how bureaucratic organization shapes the willingness and capacity of government agencies to implement policy. Gibbs has published multiple articles on bureaucratic organization. His current research includes studies of legislative bargaining, political pandering, message legislation, and obstruction.
