By Anne Halliwell

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The UK College of Law’s election analysis blog hopes to become a national resource for election law, beginning with its official opening on Election Day Tuesday.

Third-year law student Aubrey Vaughan, who was one of three students to help head the project, said work on the website, uky.edu/electionlaw, began about a month ago.

The blog, which has a few posts before the Election Day activity begins, will attempt to keep Kentucky voters informed about legal issues related to the general election, said associate law professor Joshua A. Douglas, who specializes in election law.

“Election law is extremely complex but has an incredible impact on how elections are run,” Douglas said. “The whole point of the blog is to write sophisticated analysis that the general public can understand.”

Vaughan, who is also the group’s social media chair, said that while the brunt of the work will happen in the weeks before and after the election, the yearlong group would continue to analyze issues of election law in an objective, nonpartisan way.

“I kind of envision it being something … where it will become preemptively first in the state for election law,” Vaughan said.

Election law is becoming more and more of a “365-days-a-year” topic, even on non-election years, Douglas said.

“Especially if this race is close, attention will focus on Kentucky,” Douglas said.

Given the possibility of a recount, Douglas said a post about the implications of not knowing the winner of the senate election on Nov. 5 has already been posted.

“Certainly, if that happens, we’ll be an important resource for the country as a whole,” Douglas said.

Election law covers a range of topics from the beginning through the end of a campaign, Vaughan said.

The students should be able to provide broad analyses of issues ranging from campaign legality to why a student might not be able to vote at a poll, Vaughan said. The website has a hotline, which is Douglas’ office number and will be live on Election Day, she added.

Additionally, a group of students will check social media outlets to anticipate interesting talking points and attempt to analyze them as they occur to the public, Douglas said.

The blog has also allowed the students out-of-school experience in a slightly different field than normal, Douglas said.

“There are a lot of students interested in political and law work (in the law school), so this is an outlet for that,” Vaughan said.

Because election law is a branch of the wider field, Vaughan said that other schools have created similar groups and projects to help inform their respective states. In the future, the blog will maintain a Kentucky focus but look at other states’ issues as well.

“We do hope that it can turn into a good resource for students or Kentuckians, or people looking in on Kentucky races,” Vaughan said.