Saving Face and Raising Money Are Behind Election Lawsuits, Peterson Says

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Professor of Public Policy Mark Peterson spoke to Elite Daily about President Trump’s refusal to concede loss of the 2020 election. The Trump campaign has filed lawsuits in battleground states including Pennsylvania, Michigan, Arizona, Nevada and Georgia, claiming that the Democrats are trying to “steal the election” through fraud. According to Peterson, these suits have been brought without evidence. “Donald Trump as an individual just cannot accept loss, and no one around him wants to take on the force of his personality, internal hurts and capacity to lash out,” Peterson said. He sees the “simulated controversy” as a last-ditch effort to save face and an opportunity to keep money flowing into the Trump campaign to pay off debts and finance the Republican National Committee. He added that the GOP needs the conservative base in Georgia to “remain highly agitated and energized” for the high-stakes Senate runoff elections in January.

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Yaroslavsky on Crisis in Sheriff’s Department

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Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin, joined KPCC’s “AirTalk” to discuss tensions between the L.A. County Board of Supervisors and Sheriff Alex Villanueva. The supervisors have voted 3-2 to explore options to impeach or reduce the responsibilities of Villanueva. Yaroslavsky, a former L.A. County supervisor, said there is always some tension between the sheriff and the supervisors, but they’ve historically been able to work together to adhere to their constitutional responsibilities. However, he said, Villanueva has violated agreements on constitutional policing issues, including excessive use of force. Yaroslavsky agreed that it is important to raise the idea of changing the way that sheriffs are chosen but said he doesn’t think voters would approve the measure. “The resources and energies that would have to be brought to bear on a constitutional amendment or charter change should be brought to bear on removing him from office in the regularly scheduled election,” he said.

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Segura Digs Deeper Into Black and Brown Voter Turnout

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Dean Gary Segura spoke to PBS NewsHour about the policy priorities of Black and brown voters who helped secure President-elect Joe Biden’s victory. Segura co-founded the polling and research firm Latino Decisions, which helped produce the American Election Eve Poll 2020. In that survey, Black voters named discrimination and racial justice as the second most important issue candidates should address, after the coronavirus pandemic. While Latinos voted in higher numbers for Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, Segura noted that seven out of 10 voted for Biden this year, which is still above the historical average. “The Latino margin will exceed the victory margin in Nevada and Arizona and New Mexico and Colorado. We think Latinos gave over a 120,000-vote margin to Vice President Biden in Philadelphia, which means without Latino votes, you would not have had the vice president carry Pennsylvania,” Segura said. “This is also true for African Americans, of course. So like all victories, there are many owners.”

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Matute on Future of Hyperloop Technology

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Juan Matute, deputy director of the Institute of Transportation Studies at UCLA Luskin, spoke to the New York Times about the challenges facing hyperloop technology, which would theoretically enable transportation of people and goods at speeds up to 600 miles an hour. Virgin Hyperloop recently became the first company to conduct a human test of the technology at a test track in Las Vegas. The company hopes to eventually use the technology to move passengers and cargo in vacuum tubes between cities and ports, cutting travel time significantly. However, transportation experts noted that the hyperloop system would require expensive maintenance. Matute pointed out that, like high-speed rail systems, hyperloop companies will have to acquire expensive rights of way. The tubes that carry hyperloop pods will have to be very straight with wide turns in order to enable high-speed travel. “Airlines do not have this problem,” Matute said. 

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Ong Examines Asian American Voter Trends

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Paul Ong, director of the Center for Neighborhood Knowledge at UCLA Luskin, was featured in an NBC article discussing voting trends among Asian Americans. Early exit polls indicated that Asian American voters heavily favored Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden over President Donald Trump. While Biden performed well, the data suggests that Trump’s level of support among  Asian Americans did not decline. During the pandemic, anti-Asian sentiment across the country contributed to hate incidents as well as an increase in Asian American unemployment and business closings, Ong said. He expected Trump’s use of xenophobic and discriminatory language, such as “kung flu” and “China virus,” to decrease support for the president among Asian Americans. Instead, he noted that “changes have only happened marginally, and not a massive shift.” Ong concluded that “the racialized political divide has hardened, and we face a difficult next four years.”

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Goh on Community Resilience in the Face of Climate Change

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Assistant Professor of Urban Planning Kian Goh spoke about the impact of climate change on cities and marginalized communities during two UCLA Arts and Architecture projects — an episode of the “10 Questions” series focusing on resilience and an interview on the podcast “Works in Progress.” Goh discussed her recent research in Jakarta, Rotterdam and New York, all of which are being forced to confront the growing threat of climate change. “Poor and marginalized populations are often pushed into more environmentally risky areas,” Goh said, and planners and designers are facing difficult questions about how to engage communities in future projects for a more just outcome. Goh described an empowering, grassroots notion of resilience “not only as a kind of individual ability to get back up when you’re pushed down, but that you have a community, you have a social network around you, who will help you if you cannot do it for yourself.”

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Segura and Diaz Weigh In on Influence of Latino Vote

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UCLA Luskin Dean Gary Segura spoke to El Diario about the impact of Latino voters on the outcome of the presidential election. Segura noted that Latino participation was “very strong” in Nevada, Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Colorado — states that were crucial in Democrat Joe Biden’s victory. According to Latino Decisions, a political opinion research firm co-founded by Segura, Biden had particularly strong support among Mexican and Puerto Rican voters. The pandemic, which disproportionately affects Latinos, and the economy were important factors in mobilizing the Latino vote. “Work has become the most important thing for the community, and not the political parties,” Segura said. El Diario also cited Sonja Diaz, executive director of the Latino Policy and Politics Initiative, which is researching Latino engagement in the election. “In counties with high Latino density, many of them key in this count, Latino voters opted for Vice President Biden,” Diaz said.

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Cohen on Involuntary Psychiatric Detentions as a Social Justice Issue

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Social Welfare Professor David Cohen was featured in a Mad in America article summarizing his research findings on psychiatric detentions in the United States. According to Cohen’s research, the rate at which Americans are confined against their will under mental health laws has increased dramatically over the past decade. “This is the most controversial intervention in mental health — you’re deprived of liberty, can be traumatized and then stigmatized — yet no one could tell how often it happens in the United States,” Cohen said. “We saw the lack of data as a social justice issue, as an accountability issue.” He gathered data from court and justice systems, journal articles, state health websites and other sources to fill the gaps in literature. Cohen concluded that “state and private agencies, lay and professional groups, and independent researchers should shed more light on involuntary psychiatric detentions, their correlates and their outcomes.”

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Torres-Gil on California’s Plan to Address Aging

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Professor of Social Welfare and Public Policy Fernando Torres-Gil spoke to Senior Living Foresight about a new California report on government responses to aging. The article summarized two government-initiated efforts: a federal report, prepared in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, that suggests improving funding, infrastructure and access to personal protective equipment in nursing homes; and a report by the Stakeholders Committee for the California Master Plan for Aging, which Torres-Gil summarized. The California report calls for improving long-term care services and support systems, ending poverty, and ensuring affordable housing and equity of resources for all, regardless of individual circumstances. The report notes the impact of ageism, ableism and systemic racism — exacerbated by COVID-19 — on older adults and people with disabilities, especially in Black, Native American and Latino communities. “We are leading the nation,” Torres-Gil said of the statewide efforts. “We can show that there is no need to be afraid of diversity.”

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Taylor on Outdated Speed Limits

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 Brian Taylor, director of the Institute of Transportation Studies at UCLA Luskin, spoke to BYU Radio about how cities, counties and states set speed limits. According to the “85th percentile rule,” about 85% of drivers on a given road will go at or below a reasonable speed, while about 15% will drive faster than is safe. Developed in the 1930s, this rule has evolved from a starting point for determining speed limits in rural areas to the rule of law in complex urban traffic environments. Motorists who would like to go faster are often at odds with residents, cyclists and pedestrians, but setting a lower limit won’t necessarily make people slow down, said Taylor, a professor of urban planning and public policy. He said that crash history and data from mobile devices can be used to set more dynamic speed limits that take into account time of day, weather conditions and other factors that affect safe driving.

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