I am a Research Fellow at the Center for Inter-American Policy and Research (CIPR) at Tulane University. I hold a PhD and MA in Political Science from Tulane University, along with a Master of Public Administration (MPA) and a BA in Psychology from Texas State University.

My current research focuses on the intersection of organized crime and electoral politics. Broadly speaking, I am interested in understanding the emergence of collusive arrangements between organized crime groups (OCGs) and political actors and the subsequent effects of such arrangements.

In my dissertation, I study the effects of collusive arrangements on electoral competition and electoral integrity in Mexico through a systematic analysis of the fuel, gas, and oil (FGO) theft criminal enterprise. My main motivation for conducting this research is to contribute both theoretically and empirically to the literature on the political-criminal nexus and to our understanding about non-institutional mechanisms that diminish the quality of democracy in the developing world.