Olivia Paschal

Intern

Olivia is an undergraduate at Yale University majoring in history and political science, with focuses on state and local policy and Southern religion and culture. She is a director's fellow at the Institution for Social and Policy Studies and previously served as a managing editor for The Politic, Yale's undergraduate journal of politics and culture. She has written and advocated for reforms on issues ranging from sexual assault to mass incarceration and welfare.

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Articles by Olivia

The latest challenges to the South's felony disenfranchisement laws

By Olivia Paschal

July 14, 2017 - A ballot initiative campaign in Florida and a lawsuit against Louisiana seek to restore voting rights to people convicted of felonies after they're released from prison. The efforts are parts of a broader movement to overturn felony disenfranchisement laws rooted in white-supremacist politics.

Lessons from South Carolina's overlooked special election

By Olivia Paschal

June 27, 2017 - While much of the country was focused on last week's special election in Georgia's 6th Congressional District, Democrat Archie Parnell pulled off a 17-point leftward swing in South Carolina’s strongly GOP 5th. His near-victory offers insight for the 2018 midterms and raises questions about the kind of candidate who can win in the South.

The rural South defies demographic and political stereotypes

By Olivia Paschal

June 16, 2017 - Rural areas draw the ire of Trump opponents on the left and right who charge that residents voted against their own interests. But in the South, which has the country's biggest rural Black population and growing numbers of rural Hispanics, many of the rural communities most threatened by Trump's policies did not vote for him.

Trump budget would devastate vulnerable Southern communities

By Olivia Paschal

May 26, 2017 - The Trump administration's budget proposal would cut billions of dollars in funding for programs that provide essential services to vulnerable rural and immigrant communities across the South — with no plan for how to replace them.