Joe Morris emerges as sought-after political analyst
For a guy who doesn’t play hardball, he’s got an unlikely bucket-list item
By Deborah W. Morton
The New York Times , C-SPAN, Fox News, NBC … the list of high-profle media outlets seeking political analysis from Mercyhurst’s Dr. Joe Morris continues to grow. The reason is simple. Morris, who chairs the university’s Department of Political Science, has evolved into a quick-thinking, articulate, and objective news source whose credibility stems from his own insightful grasp of political events to his more encompassing take on the public pulse. The latter he gauges through public opinion polling he oversees as director of the Mercyhurst Center for Applied Politics (MCAP). Also, the fact that a historically blue county like Erie turned red for Donald Trump in 2016 has all eyes on this region as the 2020 presidential race heats up. Morris has become the go-to guy for putting the issues, the candidates, and the controversies in perspective. A beloved professor, the lights, camera, action routine didn’t become part of his wheelhouse until 2017. His predecessor, Dr. Michael Federici, was the man in the spotlight for many years. When Federici left Mercyhurst in May 2017 to take a position at Middle Tennessee State University, Morris stepped into the role, intent on keeping Mercyhurst’s Poli Sci department the expert on local and regional politics. To that end, he has been hugely successful. But, never did he think he’d be sitting in the same room being interviewed by two-time Emmy Award winner and former CBS and CNN news correspondent Joie Chen, who was at Mercyhurst in July to prepare a segment for the Hearst Television political magazine program “Matter of Fact with Soledad O’Brien.” Nor did he expect to be a guest of C-SPAN when its bus rolled into Erie in October to gather key insights on Pennsylvania’s role in Campaign 2020. And who would have fgured that Keisuke Katori, a Washington, D.C.-based reporter for The Asahi Shimbun , widely recognized as Japan’s leading national newspaper with a daily circulation of nearly 8 million, would seek out Morris for a sit-down? Besides his knowledge and engaging on-camera persona, Morris’ popularity stems from his willingness to accommodate. Recently, he was driving his son, Logan, to a youth hockey game down state when an interview request from New York Times national correspondent Trip Gabriel came in. Rather than seek a more convenient time, he hooked up his Bluetooth and did the interview on the road.
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