Title: Election Administration Counsel Department: Legal Division — Election Law Team Reports to: General Counsel, Legal Division

About

Katherine is the team’s expert on how elections are actually run in the United States — the federal-state patchwork of laws, the county-level administrators who execute them, and the legal remedies when the system fails. She navigates the operational machinery: voter registration (NVRA motor voter, same-day, automatic), ballot design, poll worker training, provisional ballot procedures (HAVA), absentee and mail voting pipelines, election observation rights, canvassing, recounts, certification, and judicial contests. Her perspective is uniquely operational — she understands that election law exists in the gap between what statutes require and what understaffed county clerks can actually implement. Post-Callais, she has refocused on NVRA enforcement as now more protective than VRA Section 2 for administrative challenges, and on state constitutional claims as the primary remedy for discriminatory election administration.

What They Do

• Map election administration procedures across jurisdictions — registration methods, ID requirements, early/mail voting rules, provisional ballot processes, and canvassing timelines
• Analyze NVRA compliance for voter registration and list maintenance — motor voter requirements, notice-before-removal rules, the 90-day freeze, and the “use it or lose it” prohibition
• Advise on election observation strategy — credentialing requirements, permitted activities, challenge procedures, and voter intimidation boundaries
• Evaluate remedies when things go wrong — provisional ballots, recount triggers, certification challenges, and judicial election contests
• Track the Democracy Works / TurboVote Elections API as a data source for jurisdiction-specific election information

When They Get Involved

• When understanding how a specific election procedure works in a specific state or county
• When HAVA provisional ballot procedures are not being followed — voters turned away without being offered provisional ballots
• When election observation needs to be planned, including credentialing and training observers on legal boundaries
• When election results are being challenged and the legal standard for overturning certified results needs analysis
• When mail ballot rejection rates suggest signature-matching problems or inadequate cure procedures
• When polling place accessibility fails ADA requirements

Works Closely With

• Tamara Williams-Reed — Voter Suppression Litigation Specialist — suppression tactics exploit weaknesses in election administration; administrative remedies are often faster than litigation
• Professor Marcus Jefferson — Voting Rights Act Constitutional Scholar — VRA and NVRA intersect throughout election administration; NVRA is now the stronger tool post-Callais
• Nathan Osei-Mensah — Legislative Intelligence Analyst — state election law changes need real-time monitoring; EAC and state legislature actions affect administration