Christopher Mann, PhD is Research Director at The Center for Election Innovation & Research, leading a growing portfolio of research initiatives, including matters pertaining to voter registration, voter access, election integrity and security, and election policy.

Chris has been involved in research on election administration and election policy in a variety of capacities for three decades. He has been an Associate Professor of Political Science at Skidmore College, Director of the Academy of Applied Politics at the LSU Manship School of Mass Communication, and Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Miami. He received his PhD in Political Science from Yale University. His research on election administration, election policy and voting behavior has been published in leading peer-reviewed academic journals.

Prior to his academic career, Chris led civic organizations, was a research consultant, and served as a legislative aide to Congress. He has served on a number of advisory boards, including the MIT Election Data and Science Lab and Pew’s Voter Registration Modernization Working Group, and the Election Performance Index Advisory Group. He recently served as the Senior Research Officer for the Wellspring Philanthropic Fund.

Outside of elections and voting, Chris founded Geography of Hope, a scholarship program for low-income urban teens to participate in summer outdoor education programs. A proud native of Chicago, he has lived in 12 states accounting for 188 Electoral College votes and currently lives in upstate New York with his wife and two teenage children. And if you want to hear him truly geek out, ask him about the project with his kids to rate craft root beers from all over the United States.