Carah Ong Whaley

Carah Ong Whaley is director of election protection at Issue One. Previously, she worked at the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia. She serves as co-chair of the American Political Science Association’s Civic Engagement section. She is co-author and editor of The Red Ripple: The 2022 Midterm Elections and What They Mean for 2024 (Rowman & Littlefield, 2022); Civic Pedagogies: Teaching Civic Engagement in an Era of Divisive Politics (Springer, 2024); Leaning Into Politics: Higher Education’s Role in Building the Democracy We Need (Information Age Press, 2024); and other publications. Whaley was previously associate director of the James Madison Center for Civic Engagement at James Madison University (VA) and worked for nongovernmental organizations on nuclear weapons and security issues from 1999 to 2012. In 2020, she was appointed by the governor of Virginia to the Complete Count Commission for the 2020 Census. Whaley holds a Ph.D. in American government and a master’s in foreign affairs from the University of Virginia and degrees in Spanish and global peace and security from the University of California, Santa Barbara.