Gerrymandering & Fair Representation
10:00 - 11:30 am
WILL ADLER
Redistricting reform, open election data, community action
Will is the Senior Technologist in Elections & Democracy at Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT), where he works to ensure that American elections are fair, accessible, and secure.
Before joining CDT, Will worked on tech issues in the office of U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren. He also worked at the Princeton Gerrymandering Project at Princeton University, advancing the causes of redistricting reform and open election data.
He has published pieces in numerous peer-reviewed journals and popular press outlets, including the New York Times, FiveThirtyEight, and Scientific American.
Will holds a BA in Psychology from Carleton College and a PhD in Neuroscience from New York University.
His website can be found here: https://wtadler.com/
MICHAEL LI
Legal issues in redistricting, elections, and voting rights
Michael Li serves as senior counsel for the Brennan Center’s Democracy Program, where his work focuses on redistricting, voting rights, and elections. Prior to joining the Brennan Center, Li practiced law at Baker Botts L.L.P. in Dallas for ten years. He was the author of a widely cited blog on redistricting and election law issues that the New York Times called “indispensable.”
He is a regular writer and commentator on election law issues, appearing on PBS Newshour, MSNBC, and NPR, and in print in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, Roll Call, Vox, National Journal, Texas Tribune, Dallas Morning News, and San Antonio Express-News, among others.
In addition to his election law work, Li previously served as executive director of Be One Texas, a donor alliance that oversaw strategic and targeted investments in nonprofit organizations working to increase voter participation and engagement in historically disadvantaged African American and Hispanic communities in Texas.
Li received his JD with honors from Tulane Law School and an undergraduate degree in history from the University of Texas at Austin.
YouTube video: Understanding Reapportionment and Redistricting (Feb 2021)
MOON DUCHIN
The mathematics of gerrymandering
Moon Duchin is Professor of Mathematics at Tufts University and was one of the faculty who founded the interdisciplinary Science, Technology, and Society Program. She runs the MGGG Redistricting Lab as one of the research groups at Tisch College of Civic Life.
Duchin's areas of mathematical interest are in geometric group theory, low-dimensional topology, and dynamics. Her applied research program is in data science for civil rights, and the MGGG Redistricting Lab has become a leading group in the national efforts to better understand census, redistricting, and electoral systems.
The Lab has built the Districtr public mapping tool that will be used around the country in the redistricting cycle in 2021 by legislatures, redistricting commissions, and parallel public processes. A second major project is the GerryChain software packages that harness the mathematics of Markov chains to build thousands or millions of alternative districting plans, helping people explore the range of possibility in redistricting.
Other major research and software development areas for the Lab include differential privacy in the Census, ranked choice voting, and the future of the Voting Rights Act.
YouTube lecture: Political Geometry: The Mathematics of Redistricting (Nov 2018)
