The 2026 midterms are still months away, but a new tool shows where the trouble is most likely to erupt. Samantha Tarazi, co-founder and CEO of the nonpartisan Voting Rights Lab (VRL), joins Archon Fung and Stephen Richer to walk through VRL’s new Election Risk Heat Map, which scores every state and county in the country on “Election Risk Index” measured from 1 to 100.

This episode examines what the map actually measures, assesses whether its risk factors are appropriate, and considers some of the difficult communications challenges in the space, including: How can we inform people about real threats to election administration without scaring them away from the ballot box? In light of President Trump’s recent primetime address on “election integrity,” we explore whether the threats he described are real, the role he may play in the broader risk environment, and where 2026 sits on the danger scale.

About our Guest:

Samantha Tarazi is the co-founder and chief executive officer of Voting Rights Lab, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization founded in 2017 that tracks and works to strengthen voting laws across all fifty states. As founder and former chief operating officer, she built VRL’s signature Election Policy Tracker—now a tool used daily by journalists, lawmakers, and advocates to monitor voting legislation in real time nationwide—and led the organization’s move into grassroots advocacy and cross-partisan democratic engagement. Her newest project is the 2026 Election Risk Heat Map, which VRL released this month. 

Before VRL, Tarazi was the inaugural chief engagement officer at Everytown for Gun Safety, where she helped grow Moms Demand Action from a small online group into a national volunteer network of more than 55,000 leaders. She’s been described as a “serial social-impact entrepreneur and seasoned community organizer,” with expertise spanning election administration, voter participation, mis- and disinformation, and the role of social media and AI in elections. She also serves with the National Task Force on Election Crises. 

About Terms of Engagement 

From rank-choice voting to reconciliation, American democracy is headline news. Let’s talk about it. 

Join Harvard Ash Center’s Archon Fung and Stephen Richer for a weekly conversation about the latest developments in American politics. Blending perspectives from both the political right and left, Terms of Engagement addresses breaking news, providing insights from research and practice to deliver a unique perspective you won’t hear anywhere else.

Contact Us

Send questions, ideas, and feedback to us at [email protected]. 

About the Hosts

Archon Fung is the Winthrop Laflin McCormack Professor of Citizenship and Self-Government at the Harvard Kennedy School and the Director of the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation. His research explores policies, practices, and institutional designs that deepen the quality of democratic governance with a focus on public participation, deliberation, and transparency. He has authored five books, four edited collections, and over fifty articles appearing in professional journals. He received two S.B.s — in philosophy and physics — and his Ph.D. in political science from MIT.

Stephen Richer is the former elected Maricopa County Recorder, responsible for voter registration, early voting administration, and public recordings in Maricopa County, Arizona, the fourth largest county in the United States. Prior to being an elected official, Stephen worked at several public policy think tanks and as a business transactions attorney.  Stephen received his J.D. and M.A. from The University of Chicago and his B.A. from Tulane University.

Stephen has been broadly recognized for his work in elections and American Democracy.  In 2021, the Arizona Republic named Stephen “Arizonan of the Year.”  In 2022, the Maricopa Bar Association awarded Stephen “Public Law Attorney of the Year.”  In 2023, Stephen won “Leader of the Year” from the Arizona Capitol Times.  And in 2024, Time Magazine named Stephen a “Defender of Democracy.”

About the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation

The Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation, a research center at Harvard Kennedy School, is Harvard’s hub for the study, discussion, and analysis of democracy. The Ash Center’s mission is to develop ideas and foster practices for equal and inclusive, multi-racial and multi-ethnic democracy and self-government.

Music Credit: Straight to the Point, Music Media Group