The security of the Nov. 5 elections will be the focus of the Wednesday, Oct. 30, Conversations on Race and Policing program, which will take place at 1 p.m. on Zoom, and feature retired Orange County registrar of voters, Neal Kelley.

Free and open to the public, it can be accessed from a PC, Mac, Linux, iOS or Android at https://tinyurl.com/csusb-race-policing.  

Kelley served as the Orange County registrar of voters from 2005 until his retirement in 2022, and as the county’s chief election officer, he led the office responsible for conducting elections, verifying petitions and maintaining voter records.

Kelley is a former appointee and founding member of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Election Security Task Force Government Coordinating Council, where he helped to oversee the protection of the nation’s election infrastructure. He also served as a member and past chair of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC) Board of Advisors, is a former member of the EAC Voting Systems Standards Board and a former member of the EAC Technical Guidelines Development Committee. In addition, he served as a member of the 2018 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Committee on the Future of Voting.

Kelley has been invited to testify before committees of the U.S. House, the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, the Presidential Commission on Election Administration, several state legislative bodies, and both federal and state courts.

The Conversations on Race and Policing program began after the murder of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, and its aftermath. Floyd, a Black man, was killed by a white Minneapolis police officer, triggering extensive protests, demands for systemic reform in policing, and profound dialogues on race and racism. This also led to the inception of Cal State San Bernardino’s Conversations on Race and Policing, abbreviated as CoRP.

In subsequent court cases, three other former Minneapolis police officers implicated in Floyd’s death were given prison sentences.

The series has featured scholars, journalists, law enforcement officers, lawyers, activists, artists, educators, administrators and others from throughout the nation who shared their experience and expertise on issues related to race and policing.

More than 110 forums have taken place since, and video recordings of the sessions are posted online on the Conversations on Race and Policing Lecture Series Archive. 

Upcoming programs, all set for 1 p.m. Pacific Time on Wednesdays, include:

The series organizers currently include CSUSB faculty, staff, alumni, and community members, as well as collaborators from other institutions: Amber Broaden (CSUSB and CSU Dominguez Hills, psychology), Stan Futch (president, Westside Action Group), German (Brennan Center for Justice), Robie Madrigal (Pfau Library), Jeremy Murray (CSUSB History), Matt Patino (Crafton Hills College adjunct faculty and CSUSB alumnus), and Mary Texeira (CSUSB sociology).

For more information, contact Madrigal at rmadriga@csusb.edu or Murray at jmurray@csusb.edu.

Also visit the Conversations on Race and Policing webpage.