David Becker

Executive Director & Founder

David Becker is the Executive Director and Founder of the Center for Election Innovation & Research, leading this cutting-edge non-profit’s work to improve election administration through research, data, and technology. David created CEIR to be the first effort of its kind, with a proven track record of working with election officials and experts from around the country and across the aisle. Through its efforts, CEIR seeks to reverse the historical decline in voter turnout, and give election officials the tools they need to ensure that all eligible voters can vote conveniently in a system with maximum integrity.

Prior to founding CEIR, David was Director of the elections program at The Pew Charitable Trusts, driving reforms in election administration, including using technology to provide voters with information they need to cast a ballot; assessing election performance through better data; and upgrading voter registration systems. As the lead for Pew’s analysis and advocacy on elections issues, David spearheaded development of the innovative Electronic Registration Information Center, or ERIC, which to date has helped a bipartisan group of nearly two dozen states correct almost 4 million out-of-date voter records, and led to these states registering almost a million new eligible voters. David led campaigns in dozens of states, red and blue and everything in between, and directed Pew’s partnerships with state government agencies, and with private sector partners like Google, IBM, Facebook, and others.

Before joining Pew, David served for seven years as a senior trial attorney in the Voting Section of the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, where he led numerous investigations into violations of federal voting laws regarding redistricting, minority voting rights, voter intimidation, and vote dilution. During his time at the Justice Department, David worked in dozens of states enforcing federal election laws and observing elections in thousands of precincts, and served as lead trial counsel in many cases, including Georgia v. Ashcroft.

David’s appearances in the media include The New York Times, The Washington Post, MSNBC, and NPR, and he has been published several times, including by the Stanford Social Innovation Review, the University of California, Berkeley, and The Hill.

David received both his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of California, Berkeley.

Jacob Kipp

Program Manager

Jacob Kipp is Program Manager at the Center for Election Innovation & Research, facilitating strategic efforts to improve election administration through data-centric applications of research and technology.

Jacob is a graduate of William & Mary Law School, where he focused on election law and related fields. In addition to his studies, he led the William & Mary Election Law Society and received the Thomas Jefferson Prize for his student note on the regulation of hybrid political action committees.

Outside of school, Jacob has engaged in elections and election administration in various capacities. Before joining CEIR he was the Northern Virginia Regional Team Leader for Revive My Vote, a nonprofit dedicated to helping those with prior felony convictions restore their right to vote. As head of RMV’s northern Virginia operations, he oversaw a group of dedicated volunteers and worked to build strategic partnerships in the community.

Jacob has also participated in state and national political campaigns. In 2015, he managed a hard-fought campaign challenging the incumbent delegate in Virginia’s 96th District. The following year, he joined the National Republican Senatorial Committee as a law clerk in the general counsel’s office. While at the NRSC he delved into numerous states’ recount procedures as well as other matters pertaining to Election Day and post-election operations. Prior to his campaign work, he spent time at the Virginia Department of Elections updating Virginia’s recount guidelines and developing training materials for local election administrators.

Before heading to law school and becoming involved with elections, Jacob completed his undergraduate degree and worked as a sales manager at Macy’s. He earned his bachelor’s degree in cognitive science from Indiana University, where he graduated with distinction.

Jack R. Williams

Research Associate

Jack R. Williams is a Research Associate at the Center for Election Innovation & Research, where he handles data analysis and visualization, among other projects.

Jack honed his skills as a data-driven researcher during his time at various nonprofits in the Washington, DC Metro Area. At the American Society of Addiction Medicine, Jack was Coordinator of Professional Development. In that role he leveraged his knowledge of statistical analysis and programming to implement new course exams and surveys, while also automating reporting for future courses to streamline the reporting process. Before that, Jack spent time at Education Week, where he used the R programming language and other tools to gather and analyze nationwide education data. Jack’s research was the basis various publications, including one on corporal punishment in education and another on private donations to schools.

Jack earned his bachelor’s degree in political science from American University. He has experience using a variety of tools for complex data analysis, data visualization, GIS analysis, web-scraping, infographic design, and data storage/database design. Jack is also skilled at manipulating large public data sets, such as Census ACS data.

In his spare time, Jack enjoys playing Magic the Gathering and programming.

Jenny Lovell

Research Associate

Jenny Lovell is a Research Associate at the Center for Election Innovation and Research.

Before joining CEIR, Jenny worked as an Election Officer in Fairfax city. She also conducted field work with a research team from the University of Michigan, studying political movements and social networks. As assistant editor, she also helped write and edit the Oxford Handbook of Political Networks.

Jenny graduated from George Mason University with a Bachelor’s in Government and International Politics and a Minor in French. She is currently working on her Master’s in Political Science.

In the rare moments when she isn’t working or studying, Jenny enjoys sewing and international travel. So far she’s been to Nigeria (twice), Turkey, the Dominican Republic, France, and Iceland. She’s always looking for ideas on where to travel next!