I am an experienced policy researcher with a background in government and government. I currently work in industry, advancing understanding of how public servants work worldwide to help them address the major challenges facing government, including climate change and AI.
I have an extensive background in immigraiton policy. In very broad terms, I research why policy decision-makers advance certain approaches to governing migration as ones that make sense to them, producing certain dominant ways of governing this extremely complex policy space. I have researched migration governance in both the USA and Europe, focusing especially on issues of security, irregular migration, and state logics of migration control. I come to these questions from a politics and public policy background.
I hold an honorary senior fellowship at the University of Lincoln, where I was previously associate professor of international politics. I led from 2024-2026 the British Academy-funded international, interdisciplinary project “Colonialism and Migration in Global Perspective,” helping to forge a global account of how the legacies of colonialism have influenced migration governance today. With the Seeing “Illegal” Immigrants project, I have researched the way the British state has "seen" unauthorized immigrants. I earned my PhD in Politics and International Relations from the University of Edinburgh, where I completed a project on the immigration politics of the state of Arizona, and where I also earned my master's degree as a Fulbright Scholar.
I have taught undergraduate and masters-level courses in international relations, migration politics, and U.S. politics. Outside of academia, I've also worked with think tank and non-profit groups in Arizona to draft analyses and white papers. My UK research has been cited in the report of the Windrush Lessons Learned Review. I am currently academic advisor to the Windrush Commissioner’s Office.
Further back, I was a political speechwriter -- I worked in the Arizona Governor's Office, and as a political appointee, I served as speechwriter to the U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security in the Obama Administration.
You can also take a look at my CV.