Matt Grossmann

The Intersection of Political Science and Practical Politics with Matt Grossman - The Great Battlefield Podcast Matt Grossman joins The Great Battlefield podcast to talk about his career at Michigan State as Professor of Political Science, Director of The Institute for Public Policy and Social Research, and als...

I was a guest on The Great Battlefield podcast for a wide-ranging interview, mostly on connections between political science & practical politics:
greatbattlefield.com/episode/the-...

CivicSearch Search local government meetings and texts

These build on political science research & data collection on topic discussions in city councils & school boards:
civicsearch.org
We may need academic/practitioner/vibecoder coordination as these proliferate, but an era of more data on local governments is coming fast

The District Visual journalism about what happens in 3,000+ city halls across America.

On a separate project, there is also searchable databases of city council meetings, votes, and comments: district.myhamlet.com
& interesting analyses using these data:
district.myhamlet.com

The 5th edition of Campaigns & Elections (or 9th if you count the midterm updates) is ready for Fall course adoption & review:
wwnorton.com/books/978132...

School board votes are overwhelmingly unanimous & cover humdrum issues.

From a high school student's vibecoded open database of nationwide school board votes:
school-board-votes.up.railway.app
Nice example of now-possible independent research

I accept quick AI timelines but draw the line at predicting end of credit card & housing fees (tech is not the barrier). Working at a university also makes me skeptical about quick realignment of hiring to take advantage of tech efficiency (especially eliminating admin positions)

I (well codex) tried to update the @adambonica.bsky.social spreadsheet of announced DOGE layoffs (showing that they were at liberal agencies) with the actual employment changes at federal agencies. There is still a relationship, though there were also unannounced cuts at conservative agencies.

My new disambiguation page to alleviate Matt Grossman(n) confusion:
www.mattg.org/disambiguation

Legislators are raising money instead of making policy - Niskanen Center Michael Kistner finds that when legislators spend a lot of time raising money, they spend less making policy.

Legislators Are Raising Money Instead of Making Policy

By rewarding fundraising, parties miss out on diverse leaders & effective legislators. But states that reform make more policy.

New #ScienceOfPolitics with Michael Kistner on Paying for the Party
www.niskanencenter.org/legislators-...

American Journal of Political Science | MPSA Journal | Wiley Online Library An emerging literature suggests that artificial intelligence (AI) can greatly enhance autocrats' repressive capabilities. This paper argues that while AI presents a powerful new tool for authoritaria...

AI's accuracy in censorship decreases with increasing repression, especially during times of political crisis
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Despite cutting lots of federal staff, Trump did not get the spending cuts he requested from Congress:
www.nytimes.com/2026/02/17/u...

Research Obsession Day 9: In honor of president's day, thermostatic public opinion -- a very important topic!

w/ recent research by @mattgrossmann.bsky.social & @cbwlezien.bsky.social on its impact on elections

www.matthewg.org/thermostatic...

The Politics of AI Founded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, an...

Democrats use AI more than Republicans, but it is due to education, industry, and occupation
www.nber.org/papers/w34813

Empirical evidence on concentration, markups, and mergers does not show a widespread decline in US competition
www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10....

Tenure Eliminated at Oklahoma Colleges Regional and community college professors will no longer receive tenure; research university faculty are spared, with some exceptions.

Oklahoma governor is eliminating new tenure at public universities & colleges other than Oklahoma & OK State:
www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty...
These universities will operate with existing tenured faculty but current assistants will be converted to fixed-term; regents still have to accept

So few new legal constraints on admin trying it bigger this year. Constraints are mostly political: avoid unpopular actions in an election year with opinion moving against you. Hiring & grant activity will be early tells; have $ to ramp back up but want to avoid.

Lost in the ICE battles is that the parties agreed on government funding levels & provisions. Dems did not win any real constraints on recessions or DOGE-style actions and implicitly OKd some admin restructuring. But Reps did not win any real $ shifts to match Trump budget.

Re-assessing my Jan. 2025 pod with @mattgrossmann.bsky.social
✔️ Jan 6 pardons
✔️ Subdued opposition but eventual rally
✔️ Wield DOJ vs. enemies
✔️ Chilling effects of DOJ abuse
✔️ High-profile firings
✔️ Mass deportation
✔️ Challenge elections in future
❌ didn't foresee DOGE
❌ didn't foresee ICE/CBP $$$

DOGE & early shock & awe may have helped congress acquiescence in some cases (USAID, CFPB) but led to backlash in others (NIH) or little change (Ed). Where goal was reduced capacity (IRS & CFPB), easy for lower staff to = retrenchment. But unclear what will survive divided gov

Other big spending changes were approved by Congress: CFPB & IRS cuts & ICE increases were in OBBBA. USAID move was implicitly OKd in latest spending deal, though program funding remains. Multi-year NIG grants compromised. So won concessions in Congress deals, but lost others

Need update on spending power moving from Congress to President. Personnel reductions, partly through incentives, are large & presidentialized. But still spent more $ last year & Congress has reversed most planned $ cuts (including NIH & Ed). Agencies lose capacity but not funds

Congress Reaches Agreement on FY26 International Affairs Spending – USGLC Read USGLC’s FY26 International Affairs Budget Analysis on the final bipartisan NSRP appropriations deal, with topline funding totals and program level breakdowns for diplomacy, development, global he...

So for USAID, they cut to the operating expenses account 93%, which implicitly accepts the move of USAID to State. That seems to be more acceptance than happened at the Dept of Education, where the staff was cut in half but the funding for operating staff remains.
www.usglc.org/the-budget/c...

Congress Has Passed an Education Budget. See How Key Programs Are Affected Federal funding for low-income students and special education will remain level year over year.

The Education Department budget also largely rejects proposed cuts & allocates funds for staffing, IES, & admin but doesn't appear to have additional sticks for stopping administration reorganization efforts:
www.edweek.org/policy-polit...

Any explanations of leeway compared to 2025?

Sage Journals: Discover world-class research Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.

Republican governors show higher levels of populist rhetoric than Democrats, but this difference predates Trump’s presidency and shows no evidence of intensifying following his first election.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

$9.42 Billion For Global Health As US Foreign Aid Bill Passes - Health Policy Watch Among the allocations is a $9.42 billion package for global health programs - signaling strong bipartisan support and maintaining significant global health

The budget deal extends international aid, not agreeing with the presidents' cuts but spending less than last year:
healthpolicy-watch.news/9-42-billion...

Can someone explain whether they implicitly approved the move of USAID activities to State, disapproved it, or remained silent?

far-right parties benefit electorally when the current government is on the left because there is an ideological shift to the right among the electorate when left-wing parties govern
www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

The Poverty of Moral Foundation Messaging Prominent scholars have argued that reframing political positions and issues in terms of moral foundations that appeal to conservatives or liberals can attract more individual-level support for tho...

Reframing policy arguments with opponents' moral foundations did not change policy opinions across 5 issue areas:
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Partisan animosity and protest participation in the United States Abstract. In the United States, partisans are more likely to protest than other citizens. This study compares the relative strength of two explanations for

Partisan animosity increases protest participation at the individual and geographic levels
academic.oup.com/sf/article-a...

Can AI ‘vibe research’ replace social science? - Niskanen Center AI tool improvement is compounding fast enough for researchers to start using tools like Claude Code for real social science tasks.

Can AI 'vibe research' replace social science?

Experiments in research design, planning, data collection, analysis, & writing with Claude Code

New #ScienceOfPolitics podcast/transcript with Andy Hall
www.niskanencenter.org/can-ai-vibe-...

Can AI ‘vibe research’ replace social science? - Niskanen Center AI tool improvement is compounding fast enough for researchers to start using tools like Claude Code for real social science tasks.

Can AI 'vibe research' replace social science?

Experiments in research design, planning, data collection, analysis, & writing with Claude Code

New #ScienceOfPolitics podcast/transcript with Andy Hall
www.niskanencenter.org/can-ai-vibe-...