Matt Crane

Executive Director, Colorado County Clerks Association

Matt Crane is an election subject matter expert committed to using his 22 years of election administration experience to assist the election community with improving operational and security processes to help build trust and confidence in American Elections.

Matt currently serves as the Executive Director of the Colorado County Clerks Association, a not for profit 501 c (6) professional association that comprises 63 elected county clerk and recorders. As Executive Director, Matt oversees the day-to-day operations of the association, which include helping set the legislative agenda, managing contractors, press management and communications, creating and maintaining the annual budget, managing two annual conferences, and mentoring association members.

Matt also serves as an election security expert consultant for the Lafayette Group, Inc (LGI). He supports the Cybersecurity Infrastructure and Security Agency’s (CISA) Election Security Initiative (ESI) by working to foster a stronger partnership between CISA and the election stakeholder community, including states, local jurisdictions, election technology providers, and political parties. This includes building awareness of security risks, creating products and exercises to help mitigate those risks, and working to create a landscape where information sharing about risks and best practices between entities in the community is prioritized.

Before serving in these roles, Matt served as an election official in Colorado for 19 years at both the state and county level. From 2013 through 2018, he served as the Clerk and Recorder for Arapahoe County, CO. While serving as Clerk, Matt worked collaboratively with all political parties and government and industry stakeholders to improve the transparency and trust in the election process. This work included a much stronger focus on election security and information sharing among stakeholders to help improve trust and combat disinformation in the county. Under Matt’s leadership, Arapahoe County became a recognized leader in election administration, providing citizens with innovative tools to create better access to the ballot and to provide better information about the election process. Matt was also a statewide leader, serving as President of the Colorado County Clerks Association in 2016 and as the Legislative Co-chair for the Colorado County Clerks Association from 2015 through 2018. Matt has also worked with the federal Election Assistance Commission to help create national best practices for conducting in-person voting.

Matt is a nationally certified election administrator (CERA) through the Election Center and Auburn University, as well as a Colorado Certified Election Administrator.