IOP 2016 Fall Fellows to Focus on Presidential Election

Former Secretary of Defense Charles T. “Chuck” Hagel is one of the Institute of Politics’ visiting fellows for the fall semester, joining a roster of six resident and two visiting fellows selected broadly to focus on the current presidential election, the IOP announced Wednesday morning.

The six resident fellows include: Michael Blake, a sitting New York state assemblyman from the Bronx; Ann Compton, a former ABC news correspondent and veteran campaign reporter; James T. “Tom” Hill, a retired U.S. army four-star general; Peter Staley, co-founder of the Ad Hoc National Coalition to End the AIDS Epidemic; Sarah M. Isgur Flores, deputy campaign manager for former Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina; and, David Kochel, senior strategist for former Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush.

“We have an extraordinary class of Fellows. They are the perfect guides to lead our students through the fascinating terrain of this election year,” IOP Director Margaret A. “Maggie” Williams—who will take a leave of absence to join Democratic nominee Hillary R. Clinton's White House transition team—said in a statement.

The six resident fellows will live in Cambridge full-time during the fall semester, and will host weekly study groups in their areas of specialty for undergraduates.

The IOP also announced two visiting fellows—Hagel and James “Jim” Roosevelt, who is co-chair of the Democratic Party’s Rules and Bylaws Committee, and, until January, was CEO of the Tufts Health Plan. The two will also be on-campus during the semester, although not full-time and they will not host regular study groups.

Eric R. Andersen, director of the IOP’s fellows and study groups, said that the IOP staff and student advisory board “really had [the current election] in mind when selecting this group of fellows.”

“We really thought that it was important that we focused on the presidential campaign cycle,” he said.

The topics of the fellows’ study groups also reflect a focus on this year’s presidential election: Blake, a former Obama aide, will focus on “the practical side of politics and even more specifically the impact of race and gender,” the assemblyman said.

Compton’s study group will follow the election generally, but with a special focus on how news platforms have “transformed media coverage of this election,” she said. Compton spent more than four decades covering politics and the White House for ABC.

Flores and Kochel, both veterans of 2016 Republican primary campaigns, will also try to explain the developments of this election. Flores’s group will explore “the inside workings of a presidential campaign,” according to the IOP press release.

Hill, formerly the combat commander of U.S. Southern Command, which operates in South and Central America, will focus on the role of the military in foreign policy and issues of national security. Staley, meanwhile, will discuss his experience as a political activist working to combat the AIDS epidemic.

—Staff writer Nathaniel J. Hiatt can be reached at nathaniel.hiatt@thecrimson.com. Follow him on Twitter @nathaniel_hiatt.