Professors Linda Trautman and Michael Smith discuss the impact of felony disenfrancisement on election turnout and partisan vote share and how civil rights groups have responded to recent changes in election laws. Trautman is the lead author of a chapter on the impact of felony disenfranchisement in a 2022 book on Much sound and fury, or the new Jim Crow? The twenty-first century’s restrictive new voting laws and their impact (SUNY press). She is a professor of political science at Ohio University-Lancaster. Smith is the Chair of the Department of Social Sciences, Sociology, and Criminology at Emporia State and is the editor of that book as well as an author of five of the ten chapters in that book. They discuss their research with Radio Active Magazine hosts Spencer Graves and Craig Lubow.
This is actually the second in a series of four discussions on different parts of this book. For the other three, see:
- Voter ID and proof of citizenship (from March 1)
- Understanding Gerrymandering (from May 17)
- History of voter suppression (from June 7)