Events

The Safeguarding Democracy Project at UCLA promotes research, collaboration, and advocacy under the leadership of UCLA Law Professor Richard L. Hasen; one of the nation’s leading election scholars. The Safeguarding Democracy Project is built upon the premise that tackling issues of the U.S. election integrity must be collaborative: across ideologies, across scholarly disciplines, and as a bridge between theory and practice. Our events this semester are focused on the 2026 midterm elections. Speakers: Bill Gates, Arizona State University; Guy-Uriel E. Charles, Harvard Law School; Charles Stewart, MEDSL; Susan Stokes, University of Chicago and Tammy Patrick, Election Center.

When: 3:15pm Eastern.

Every election office scales up. Temporary hires, loaned county staff, vendor crews and returning seasonal workers. Most of the planning goes into how many people to bring on. Less goes into who will supervise them, when they have to be trained and cleared, and how the work gets handed off between shifts.Join Ready for Tuesday and Election Talent Partners for a discussion that treats surge staffing as an operations problem rather than a hiring problem. We will talk about finding the step that actually sets your pace, and why adding people somewhere else just changes where the work piles up. We will get into applicant pools, and the fact that a wider one costs staff time in the same weeks you need for training. We will cover what a shift model has to settle before the first evening shift runs, and why supervision is usually the thing that turns extra hands into finished ballots. Then the part offices skip: Keeping a few numbers as you go, and knowing which temporary employees you want back.

When: 12pm Eastern

The Carter Center and the Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University will host a webinar discussing bipartisan solutions to strengthen electoral credibility in advance of the upcoming U.S. midterm elections. The webinar, “Looming Voting Issues Facing the 2026 Midterm Election” will examine the legal, political and practical implications of proposed changes to federal election administrations that could impact the November midterm elections. The event is free and open to the public, register by visiting the event page. Speakers include David Becker, executive director and founder at the Center for Election Innovation & Research; Stephen Richer, legal fellow at the Cato Institute’s Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies; Mark P. Jones, fellow in Political Science at the Baker Institute and professor in the Department of Political Science at Rice; and Avery Davis-Roberts, director of the Democracy Program at The Carter Center.

When: 11am Eastern

Despite claims by the administration, presidents have no authority under the U.S. Constitution or other mechanisms to unilaterally alter rules for federal elections. The power to administer elections lies strictly with the states and Congress, as federal courts have repeatedly concluded. State and local election officials have a history of overseeing free and fair elections—even during recent emergencies and foreign interference—to ensure they accurately reflect the will of the American people. Please join the Center for American Progress for a conversation with top law enforcement and election officials that will spotlight the role that state attorneys general and secretaries of state play in administering safe and secure elections and the coordination required across state offices, providing transparency into the process for constituents.

When: 10am Eastern.

The Safeguarding Democracy Project at UCLA promotes research, collaboration, and advocacy under the leadership of UCLA Law Professor Richard L. Hasen; one of the nation’s leading election scholars. The Safeguarding Democracy Project is built upon the premise that tackling issues of the U.S. election integrity must be collaborative: across ideologies, across scholarly disciplines, and as a bridge between theory and practice. Our events this semester are focused on the 2026 midterm elections. Speakers: Jonathan Diaz, Campaign Legal Center; Matt Germer, R Street Institute; and Justin Leavitt, Loyola Law School.

When: 3:15pm Eastern.