Susan Navarro Smelcer

Susan Navarro Smelcer is an Assistant Professor of Politics and International Affairs at Wake Forest University, located in Winston-Salem, NC. Her research focuses on how legal actors use non-legal tools to influence law and institutions, with expertise in American Constitutional Law, Judicial Politics, Computational Text Analysis, and Political Methodology. She holds a JD from NYU Law School (2016), a PhD and MA in Political Science from Emory University (2015, 2008), and a BA from UNC Chapel Hill (2003).

Before joining Wake Forest, she taught civil procedure and legal analytics at Georgia State University College of Law, practiced antitrust law in Washington DC, and served as an Analyst on the Federal Judiciary at the Congressional Research Service (CRS). At CRS, she advised on judicial appointments, court administration, and participated in Senate Impeachment Trial Committee work.

Her work spans legal compliance, judicial behavior, and regulatory frameworks, with publications in top journals like Cornell Law Review and N.Y.U. Law Review. Awards include the Vanderbilt Medal (NYU), Betty Bock Prize (Competition Policy), and Law and Economics Prize. Her current research examines mutual fund disclosures, antitrust dynamics, and judicial dissent patterns.

Key professional milestones include advising on judicial impeachment processes, analyzing legislative Twitter adoption, and studying bias in federal judicial nominations. She combines computational methods with legal theory to address contemporary challenges in law and governance.