Lawrence Norden is vice president of the Elections and Government Program at the Brennan Center, where he oversees a broad national portfolio of topics, including election security and administration, artificial intelligence and democracy, political violence, campaign finance, political corruption, and the election information ecosystem.
In his leadership role at the Brenan Center, Norden has helped build durable projects and coalitions aimed at strengthening American democracy. He is a founding member of the Committee for Safe and Secure Elections, a national partnership of election officials and law enforcement leaders addressing threats to election workers and election infrastructure. Earlier in his tenure, he built and scaled the Brennan Center’s election security and voting technology projects and founded New York Leadership for Accountable Government (NYLEAD), a bipartisan coalition of business, civic, and philanthropic leaders that helped successfully advance major campaign finance reform in New York State.
Norden is widely recognized as a leading authority on the intersection of democracy and technology. He is the lead author of The Machinery of Democracy: Protecting Elections in an Electronic World (2006) and a contributor to Defending Democracies: Combating Foreign Interference in a Digital Age (Oxford University Press, 2021), as well as the author of numerous nationally cited reports and articles shaping public debate on election security, AI, and democratic governance. His writing has appeared in leading publications including Foreign Affairs, The Atlantic, and Time magazine.
Beyond his organizational leadership, Norden plays an active role in national governance and advisory bodies, currently serving on the boards of advisers of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission and the Public Service Alliance and as a member of the National Task Force on Election Crises. He has also served on the Aspen Institute’s AI and Democracy Advisory Council and as a Democracy Policy Fellow at the University of California, Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public Policy.
A frequent public spokesperson and trusted expert, Norden’s work has been featured in major national media outlets, including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, CNN, Fox News, MSNBC, and NPR. He has testified before Congress and state legislatures on numerous occasions on issues related to election security, technology, and democratic governance.
He has received multiple national honors for his impact and leadership, including the Usability Professionals Association’s Usability in Civic Life Award and the Election Verification Network’s John Gideon Memorial Award. Norden holds a bachelor’s degree with honors from the University of Chicago and a JD from NYU School of Law.
Articles & Commentary
U.S. Elections Are Still Not Safe From Attack, Foreign Affairs, July 23, 2019
Mueller’s Latest Indictment Suggests Russia’s Infiltration of U.S. Election Systems Could Get Worse, Slate, July 16th, 2018
The Secret Power Behind Local Elections, New York Times, June 25, 2016