Research
What are the political, social, and economic barriers to addressing the extreme inequality facing the United States today? When have public officials and communities successfully overcome these barriers? I study these questions through the lenses federalism, American political economy, and state politics.
Peer reviewed
(Un)Happy Incidents: The Politics of Failed Policies. Forthcoming with Oxford University Press
Brown, Colin M., Sarah E. James, Matthew Reichert, George Soroka, and Aaron Watanabe. "Setting Expectations: Rubrics as a Formative Tool for Communicating in the Social Sciences." College Teaching (2023): 1-10.
“Institutional capacities, partisan divisions, and federal tensions in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.” With Theda Skocpol & Caroline Tervo. Forthcoming in The Social and Political impact of COVID-19 in the United States special issue of the Russel Sage Foundation Journal of Social Sciences.
"Mea Culpa? The Role of Data Collection in Public Officials Acknowledging Policy Failure." State Politics & Policy Quarterly 22.1 (2022): 96-119.
“Examining the Effect of Explicit Writing Instruction on the Quality of Student Writing” with Colin Brown and George Soroka. Journal for Political Science Education. 17:1 (January 2021): 835-861.
“Beyond the Likely Voter: An Analysis of Conservative Political Outreach” with Angie Bautista-Chavez. Political Science Quarterly. 134:3 (Fall 2019): 407-443.
Works in progress
"Prove It: How partisan organizations use evidence to justify economic ideologies." Working paper.
“Evidence on using evidence: Partisan patterns of invoking research in national party platforms.” Working paper.
“State-level data collection and transparency and its impact on policymaking during the COVID-19 pandemic.” Working paper.
“Re-opening by number(s): State-level crisis policymaking and public health data.” Working paper.
Other publications
“How Conservative Political Organizations Engage and Try to Recruit Left-Leaning Constituencies,” with Angie Bautista-Chavez, Scholars Strategy Network, August 2018
“The Libre Initiative: An Innovative Conservative Effort to Recruit Latino Support,” with Angie Bautista-Chavez, Scholars Strategy Network, March 2016
Media Appearances & Contributions
Featured and quoted in "Debate Watch, Ignatian Style." Gonzaga University News. September 12, 2024.
Instructional work featured and quoted in "Encouraging Engagement." Gonzaga News. August 22, 2024.
Quoted in "Could a WA attorney general and governor work across the aisle?" by Shauna Showersby. Cascade PBS. August 20, 2024.
Featured and quoted in "GU Faculty host election Crash Course for 2024 Presidential Election" by Ruby Gross. Gonzaga Bulletin. April 9, 2024.
Quoted in "Spokane Schools Levy Fails. What's Next?" by Elena Perry. Spokesman-Review. February 15, 2024.
Interview for KHQ Local News Spokane on the House of Representatives and Kevin McCarthy. October 3, 2023.