WELCOME

I am an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Auburn University.

My research primarily centers on American politics, with emphases in civic engagement, political psychology, political communication, political geography, and electoral campaigns. I have also cultivated expertise in the politics of my home state, Montana.

Topics of special interest to me that I have developed a research agenda around include geographic polarization (i.e., the urban-rural divide) and the nationalization in American politics. I have begun exploring geographical divides in Britain and other European countries as well. I also have multiple projects relating to attitudes toward political violence in the U.S.

My peer-reviewed work has been published by or is forthcoming at Environmental Politics, Political Behavior, Political Geography, Political Research Quarterly, Legislative Studies Quarterly, Prevention Science, American Politics Research, and Publius: The Journal of Federalism.

I have also contributed commentary and analysis to the Washington Post, The Hill, National Public Radio, Democracy Journal, Washington Monthly, Reason, The Niskanen Center, and The Brookings Institute, among other outlets.

Previously, I was an Assistant Professor at Utah Valley University, Faculty Fellow at the Gary R. Herbert Institute for Public Policy, Federalism Fellow at UVU's Center for Constitutional Studies, a Postdoctoral Researcher at Johns Hopkins University, a Presidential Predoctoral Fellow in Data Science at the Data Science Institute of the University of Virginia, member of Dr. Gerald Clore's Emotion and Cognition Lab, a fellow in the Quantitative Collaborative at UVa, and an editorial assistant at the American Journal of Political Science (methodology subfield). I earned my PhD from the Department of Politics at the University of Virginia in 2020, and earned my MA and BA in political science at the University of Montana.