Although much research confirms a gender gap in political science and its subfields internationally, only recently have scholars analyzed country-specific conditions for women within the field. Our study contributes to this national-level examination of gender diversity and inclusion by examining the extent to which a gender gap within the subfield of security studies, identified in the international literature, also is present in Canada. Research on gender representation and gendered experiences mostly centers on the academic workforce in the United States. However, in this article, we share the results of a multi-method investigation into the state of gender diversity in Canadian security studies—a national context in which the university sector has signaled a strong commitment to diversity and the government has actively promoted gender equality in official policy. By analyzing data collected from an online survey of security studies scholars in Canada and a document analysis of Canadian security-related journals and selected security studies syllabi, this contribution provides evidence that women are underrepresented in Canadian security studies and experience the subfield in less positive ways. We discuss the implications of these findings for the security studies subfield and suggest paths for future research and key recommendations.

Former president Trump has maintained broad support despite falsely contending that he was the victim of electoral fraud, also known as the “big lie.” We consider both the antecedents of this phenomenon and its consequences. We propose that Trump supporters’ already established deep personal alignment—identity fusion—with their leader predisposed them to believe the lie. Accepting it then set the foundation for other identity-protecting beliefs and attitudes. Using a three-wave panel of Trump supporters, we found that the more fused they were before the 2020 election, the stronger their belief in the big lie grew between 2021 and 2024. Accepting the big lie helped solidify fusion with Trump and had consequences for related attitudes. Belief in the big lie predicted downplaying the criminal charges against Trump and supporting his antidemocratic policy agenda. Fueled by and fueling further fusion, belief in the big lie is a primary component of a larger narrative that emboldens Trump and justifies antidemocratic behavior.

Today, few political news outlets receive universally favorable evaluations from the American public. In retaining broad public approval, local media remain a notable exception that is important to understand. We consider the durability of local news trust to criticism from politicians, focusing on Republican elites because they generally are more willing to attack the media than Democrats. In a survey experiment, we find that exposure to a Republican politician’s attack on a local newspaper dramatically reduces the public’s trust in and intent to use local news. This attack is particularly effective among Republicans, although it also leads Democrats and Independents to negatively shift their views of the local newspaper. Among those exposed to elite criticism of local news, overall trust and partisan divides between Republicans and Democrats resemble those for national media. This shows that the credibility of local news depends on the absence of elite criticism rather than resilience to it.

This article introduces the LGBTQ+ Special edition of PS. It traces major developments of queer scholarship in political science beginning with Kenneth Sherrill’s 1973 paper, “Leaders in the Gay Activist Movement: The Problem of Finding Followers,” which was the first paper presented at an APSA annual meeting on a queer topic. As part of the celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of Professor Sherrill’s first paper, this introduction describes the efforts scholars made in their work and in the American Political Science Association to legitimate LGBTQ+ scholarship during the past half decade.

What undergirds the association between religious and political conservatism and “group-serving pronatalism”; that is, support for childbearing to advance social or political goals rather than for personal fulfillment? Although recent research suggests that Christian nationalism—reflecting a desire to formally privilege conservative Christian values and identity—strongly accounts for the link, previous studies have not inquired about specific group-serving reasons to have children. Analyses of nationally representative data affirm Christian nationalism (measured in two ways) as the strongest predictor of support for group-serving pronatalism; specifically, support for having children to reverse the nation’s declining fertility, perpetuate one’s religious or racial heritage, and secure influence for one’s political group. These associations are weakly or inconsistently moderated by indicators of traditionalism, conservatism, and race. Findings affirm support for having children to advance national, religious, racial, or political goals corresponds strongly with a desire to privilege a Christian national identity and social order.

This Special Issue presents a wide array of election forecasting models for the 2024 US elections. Most of these models generate forecasts for the presidential, congressional, and gubernatorial races. The contributions are characterized by the variety of their approaches: citizen forecasting, electronic markets, large language models, machine learning, poll-based models, and regression analysis. This introduction first summarizes some of the lessons and challenges of election forecasting. We then provide a brief context of the 2024 campaign and a short overview of the articles included in the Special Issue. The forecasts point to a tight presidential race. The two-party popular-vote predictions are almost evenly split, with some favoring Donald Trump and others Kamala Harris. However, among the models that offer an Electoral College forecast, three predict that Harris will win and five predict that Trump will return to the presidency.

This article theorizes hetero-modernity as generating the heterosexualization of modernity, enacting a colonial sexual order that attempts a queer-death project through the dialectics of (re)integration and elimination. It is, in essence, the colonization of sexual existence. The emergence of the hetero-modern world pursues queer death via multiple sites of violence—political, economic, and ontological—culminating in the systemic dehumanizing of queer subjects. This sexual domination produces and sustains manifold forms of anti-queer violence. As such, the article not only proffers the queering of modernity as a critique of sexuality but also provides an intersectional analysis with raced, classed, and gendered implications. By situating Black studies and queer studies in dialogic exchange, it contends that queering modernity necessitates queering universal emancipation for sexual liberation.

Donald Trump’s bid for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination is unique in that no former president since Theodore Roosevelt in 1912 has sought the nomination of their political party, nor has a candidate sought the nomination while facing multiple criminal indictments. With data from previous nomination cycles, we use presidential nominations from 1980 to 2020 to create a forecast for the 2024 Republican primaries. The variables in the equations consist of data from the pre-primary period (e.g., money raised, cash reserves, elite endorsements, and polling results) and a second model with results of the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary to forecast the remaining primary vote. The models accurately predict Trump’s victory despite the unique nature of his candidacy.

The Indigenous data sovereignty movement has arisen out of the ambition of Indigenous peoples to benefit from data-informed policy while preventing extractive and harmful research practices by external governments or researchers. Tribes exercise the sovereign authority to choose whether and when to share data with researchers and institutions outside their communities. To provide insight into how Indigenous peoples feel about data sharing, we document meaningful variation in a unique, nationwide survey of Native Americans. We find that respondents support their tribes in sharing data for economic benefit and that those who vote in tribal elections are particularly supportive. As tribal leaders, Native communities, and external research partners address potentially harmful data gaps and build Indigenous data resources, our findings suggest the importance of carefully considering and communicating the purpose of data collection and sharing. Broad benefit to Indigenous peoples’ economic well-being is one factor that likely increases support for data sharing.

This model generates projections of the national popular vote and Electoral College votes a year in advance of the U.S. Presidential Election, before each party’s nominees are known. It forecasts the Democratic two-party popular vote in each state and the District of Columbia. It uses four independent variables: national head-to-head polling data 13 months prior to the election, the states’ prior election result, a party-adjusted home state advantage dummy variable, and a party adjusted variable simply counting the number of consecutive terms the current incumbent party has occupied the White House. New to this year’s model is a polling average approach that encompasses all possible candidate matchups for whom data is available. This year’s forecast suggests a distinct possibility of an Electoral College misfire benefitting the Republicans.

Giving money to candidates is an important but unequal form of political voice. Among those Americans worst represented as campaign contributors are Black women and Latinas. Although inequalities in income and wealth fuel inequalities in campaign contributions, resources are an incomplete explanation. This study investigates, for Black women and Latinas, whether their views on donations to candidates differ from their views on other forms of civic and political engagement. The results, including the absence of a shared norm about giving to candidates, illuminate the challenges and opportunities of mobilizing a more representative group of campaign contributors.

As societal conceptions of gender have evolved, so too have survey-based approaches to the measurement of gender. Yet, most research innovations and insights regarding the measurement of gender come from online or phone surveys in the Global North. We focus on face-to-face surveys in the Global South, specifically in the Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) region. Through in-person interviews, an online experiment, and survey experiments, we identify and assess an open-ended approach to incorporating respondent-provided gender identity in face-to-face interviews. Our results affirm that the measure is comparatively effective in minimizing discomfort and does not have substantial consequences for data quality across a diverse set of LAC countries. We discuss the potential traveling capacity of our approach and identify paths for further research on best practices in recording interviewee gender in face-to-face surveys in the LAC region and beyond.

Voter turnout is a crucial indicator of democratic health, yet forecasting turnout remains an understudied area in political science. This article presents two pioneering models for predicting US presidential election turnout: the national and the state model. The national one, using data from 1868 from 2020, employs lagged turnout as its sole predictor. The state model, covering 1984 to 2020, incorporates demographic and institutional variables to forecast state-level participation. The national predicts 65.3% turnout for 2024, whereas the state model forecasts increased turnout in 41 states compared to 2020. The models’ ability to generate early predictions offers valuable lead time for planning and resource allocation, which has implications for election administrators and political campaigns, as well as for the vibrancy of civic engagement in America.

The descriptive representation of stigmatized groups has numerous benefits both to group members and society at large. We study the extent to which LGB members of the US Congress provide increased support for LGBT rights. While LGBT substantive representation has been studied extensively, descriptive representation has been examined extensively at only the local and state levels. The absence of research at the federal level is important because federal policy is essential to expanding gay rights. We overcome issues related to the small number of openly LGBT Members of Congress and the few bills either introduced or receiving votes by examining LGB legislators over 24 years (i.e., 6,425 legislator–Congress pairs) using Human Rights Campaign scores. Using Coarsened Exact Matching, we find a substantively small but statistically significant and consistently positive effect: LGB members of Congress are more supportive of LGBT rights than other members with a similar background and from a similar district. The use of matching may provide a useful approach for scholars who are interested in studying the link between descriptive and substantive representation for other small groups.

In 2023, both Democratic and Republican elected officials supported banning official use of the gender-neutral term “Latinx.” Using a nationally representative survey sample, this study examines whether opposition to the gender-neutral term “Latinx” suggests a potential wedge issue that cuts across partisanship. We find that opposition to “Latinx” is significantly higher among Republican partisans, those who disapprove of Joe Biden as president, and those with “colder” feelings toward Democrats. Opposition to “Latinx” generally converges with factors that predict existing partisan divisions; where it diverges, it does not affect respondent evaluations of Biden or feelings about Democrats. Based on these findings, we conclude that gender-neutral language currently shows little potential as a wedge issue.

Political science educators have a responsibility to design their programs in a way that incorporates content that involves and engages underserved populations. In recent polls, a significant majority of Generation Z identified as LGBTQ+, representing a percentage that is larger than those who identify as African American or Hispanic (Jones 2024; Public Religion Research Institute 2024). Implementing changes in mainline political science courses (e.g., introduction to American national government, the presidency, and comparative politics) will allow the discipline to better serve LGBTQ+ students. Ample examples involving LGBTQ+-themed content provide instruction in a wide battery of political science courses. Pivoting into a more supportive pedagogy may be a successful strategy for addressing the oncoming “population cliff” (i.e., a projected decline in college enrollment) that will impact the number of students beginning college in the future. Whereas the process will require substantial investment in energy to initiate, an updated approach to teaching political science courses will reap dividends in terms of student interest, engagement with course material, and LGBTQ+ representation in the profession.

This article considers both presidential approval and party brand differentials, as measured by the generic ballot, to forecast the 2024 US presidential and congressional elections. Although both variables are leveraged to forecast collective partisan election outcomes, we consider the variables together as distinct determinants of partisan fortunes at both the executive and legislative levels. First, using a novel time series of mass national opinion since 1937, we show that presidential approval and generic brands are distinct conceptual and empirical measures of mass public assessments of collective institutions. Second, in a series of fully specified models validated with out-of-sample predictions, we show that presidential approval is the main predictor of presidential elections, yet, perhaps surprisingly, the vast bulk of the incumbent party’s performance in congressional elections is explained by partisan brands. Lastly, we forecast the 2024 U.S. national elections and find that Republicans are well positioned to win back the White House this November. By contrast, our model forecasts control of both chambers of the US Congress to be essentially a tied contest.

Sweeping changes in abortion politics are underway in the Americas. Argentina, Mexico, Colombia, and Uruguay have legalized abortion in recent years, marking a sea change in the most Catholic region of the world. At the same time, several states in the United States have restricted abortion access following the US Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe vs. Wade, and numerous Central American countries have moved to fully criminalize the practice. Abortion is now legal in countries where it was long taboo, whereas the United States is characterized by a patchwork of laws that spans from some of the most progressive in the world to near-total bans. What explains this changing panorama in terms of reproductive rights in the Americas?

Latin America historically has had some of the strictest abortion laws in the world, making unsafe procedures a main cause of mortality among women and girls. However, in the context of the Green Wave, three countries recently have amply decriminalized access to abortion: Mexico (2021, 2023), Colombia (2022), and Argentina (2020) (Uruguay did so in 2012). The recent wave of decriminalization is the culmination of larger, historical processes that involved the gradual judicialization of reproductive rights in the region. Courts have been a central part of the story. In these three cases, arguments advanced by state and nonstate actors in favor of decriminalization significantly built on jurisprudence developed over many years. The process of abortion decriminalization has been partly a tale of gradual judicialization.

Survey researchers increasingly recognize the need to update their gender questions to recognize the existence of transgender and nonbinary people. In this research note, we evaluate changes to the Canadian Election Study (CES) gender questions from 2019 to 2021. Our analyses suggest researchers should add “nonbinary” as a close-ended option and an open-ended response option to gender identity questions. They also suggest that researchers should not include “transgender” in a separate, mutually exclusive response option alongside men and women in gender identity questions but instead identify transgender men and women through a follow-up question. These recommendations can help guide the design of future surveys.