Doug Bock Clark

Reporter

Photo of Doug Bock Clark

Doug Bock Clark is a reporter in ProPublica’s South unit. He investigates threats to democracy and abuses of power throughout the region.

Clark was previously a correspondent at GQ magazine, where his investigations contributed to getting two women off death row and revealed how the Trump administration had distorted classified intelligence to push the nation toward a confrontation with North Korea. His reporting for the New York Times Magazine helped free two unjustly imprisoned men from a foreign jail.

Clark has previously written about the South for the New Yorker, Rolling Stone, Mother Jones and Wired. He won the Arthur L. Carter Reporting Award and has been a finalist for the Livingston Award, the Mirror Award and the Excellence in Features Award from the Society of Features Journalists. His first book, “The Last Whalers,” was one of the New York Times’ 100 Notable Books of 2019 and a finalist for the William Saroyan International Writing Prize and the Lowell Thomas Travel Book Award. He has produced two feature documentaries inspired by his articles: “Assassins,” which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and played in theaters worldwide, and “The Last Cruise” for HBO.

A Georgia Election Official’s Months-Long Push to Make It Easier to Challenge the 2024 Results

Julie Adams quickly ascended from a little-known conservative activist to a surprise appointee on the Fulton County board of elections. She has used her new perch to carry out the efforts of players seeking to tilt the election in Trump’s favor.

Election Skeptics Are Targeting Voting Officials With Ads That Suggest They Don’t Have to Certify Results

The ads, which have been placed in swing states like Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, come from a new group with deep ties to activists who have challenged the legitimacy of recent elections.

Georgia Judge Rules Election Officials Must Count All Votes and Certify Results

The judge ruled that “Georgia voters would be silenced” if county election board members were “free to play investigator, prosecutor, jury, and judge” and refuse to certify election results.

Right-Wing Activists Pushed False Claims About Election Fraud. Now They’re Recruiting Poll Workers in Swing States.

Experts say these poll workers could sow distrust in democracy and bolster court cases challenging the election. ProPublica and Wisconsin Watch reviewed dozens of hours of trainings and presentations in which activists discussed their plans.

Election Skeptics Are Running Some County Election Boards in Georgia. A New Rule Could Allow Them to Exclude Decisive Votes.

An examination of a new election rule in Georgia suggests that local officials in just a handful of rural counties could exclude enough votes to affect the outcome of the 2024 presidential race.

Officials Voted Down a Controversial Georgia Election Rule, Saying It Violated the Law. Then a Similar Version Passed.

The rule, which was pushed by nationally prominent election deniers, only changed in minor ways between being voted down in May and approved in August. Those adjustments made it even less compliant with existing law, experts say.

Election Deniers Secretly Pushed Rule That Would Make It Easier to Delay Certification of Georgia’s Election Results

On Monday, the GOP-controlled State Election Board is poised to adopt the rule, which would potentially allow county officials, including one who secretly backed the rule, to throw the election results of the swing state into chaos this fall.

“A Terrible Vulnerability”: Cybersecurity Researcher Discovers Yet Another Flaw in Georgia’s Voter Cancellation Portal

The flaw would have allowed anyone to submit a voter registration cancellation request for any Georgian using their name, date of birth and county of residence — information that is easily discoverable online.

Marjorie Taylor Greene’s and Brad Raffensperger’s Voter Registrations Targeted in Georgia’s New Online Portal

Days after Georgia Democrats warned that the state’s new online portal for canceling voter registrations could be abused, officials have confirmed misuse attempts — including efforts to cancel the registrations of prominent Republicans.

North Carolina Supreme Court Secretly Squashed Discipline of Two GOP Judges Who Admitted to Violating Judicial Code

The decisions came despite the Judicial Standards Commission’s recommendations to publicly reprimand the judges, and these are likely the only times in more than a decade in which the court didn’t follow the commission’s guidance.

Georgia Promised to Fix How Voter Challenges Are Handled. A New Law Could Make the Problem Worse.

SB 189, which goes into effect in July, will give Georgia residents more time to contest the eligibility of fellow citizens’ inclusion on voter rolls and make it easier to use questionable evidence in those challenges.

Close to 100,000 Voter Registrations Were Challenged in Georgia — Almost All by Just Six Right-Wing Activists

The recent transformation of the state’s election laws explicitly enabled citizens to file unlimited challenges to other voters’ registrations. Experts warn that election officials’ handling of some of those challenges may clash with federal law.

Two Republicans Kicked Off County Election Board in North Carolina for Failing to Certify Results

What happened to the officials stands in sharp contrast to elsewhere in the U.S., where those who voted against certification faced few consequences.

Some Election Officials Refused to Certify Results. Few Were Held Accountable.

A ProPublica review of local officials who refused to certify 2022 election results found that most did not face formal consequences. Experts explain what that means for the future of American elections.

A County Elections Director Stood Up to Locals Who Believe the Voting System Is Rigged. They Pushed Back Harder.

Even in a county where Trump won more than 70% of the 2020 vote, local election deniers have mounted a campaign to access voting machines and slash the elections director's pay.

Building the “Big Lie”: Inside the Creation of Trump’s Stolen Election Myth

Internal emails and interviews with key participants reveal for the first time the extent to which leading advocates of the rigged election theory touted evidence they knew to be disproven, disputed or dismissed as dubious.

Heeding Steve Bannon’s Call, Election Deniers Organize to Seize Control of the GOP — and Reshape America’s Elections

The stolen election myth inspired thousands of Trump supporters to take over the Republican Party at the local level, exerting more partisan influence on how elections are run.

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