I am a political scientist. I am also the proud chair of WashU's small but mighty women, gender, and sexuality studies department. Political scientists: it's time to stand w/ gender studies, Black studies and similar units. We must all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately.

The world can feel bleak these days, so I’m grateful to have a book on gender, political trust, and efficacy—written by someone so smart and generous—to flip through when I feel a little low. Get yourself a copy, too! The Politics of Perception by @kstauffer.bsky.social: shorturl.at/6BOTS

Thanks Eric! Your work on minority candidate emergence/supply was really useful for shaping our thinking on this!

Anyway, this is a long thread to say how deeply sad I feel about this news. As a gender and politics scholar, I loved my time working with A&M students and faculty. I hate to think about what current and future students and colleagues are missing out on. 5/5

We generated hypotheses together. We looked at data. We learned, together. My colleagues trusted me, and my students trusted me. It was one of the most rewarding teaching experiences of my career. 4/

But the overwhelming majority came in indifferent, and a non-trivial share were skeptical. And honestly? I welcomed it. I’m an empirical social scientist. I’m always asking (and asking my students): How would you know if you were right? And, more importantly, how would you know if you were wrong? 3/

I taught my A&M women and politics class several times, and each instance was a joy. A minority of my students arrived already interested in gender equality in politics. It was a delight to connect with them. 2/

It’s a very intense two weeks! Thank you for giving it your all! Really excited to see your dissertation, work in print sometime soon, and will definitely be following the work that comes out of your postdoc!