Pinellas County Supervisor of Elections, Julie Marcus, has dedicated her career to ensuring equal access to voter registration and ballots and transparency of the electoral process.
Beginning in 1999 while still attending the University of South Florida, then-Supervisor of Elections Dorothy Ruggles, invited Marcus, who was studying Political Science at the University of South Florida, to be a speaker as part of a new initiative to reach high school students. The objective was to educate young people about the electoral process, register them to vote and encourage civic engagement.
Marcus launched her career of public service by working as a Senior Executive Secretary with the Florida House of Representatives. In 2002, Supervisor Deborah Clark appointed Marcus to develop and manage a new Voter Outreach Department. During this time, the “Vote in Honor of a Vet” program was born and received the “Superior Award” from the National Association of County Information Officers.
In 2007, Marcus was appointed Deputy Supervisor of Elections and was selected to serve on the Citizens Advisory Committee that was tasked with making a recommendation to the Pinellas Board of County Commissioners on an optical scan voting system. The voting system recommended by the committee is still in use today.
In 2012, Clark appointed Marcus as the Chief Deputy Supervisor of Elections. In this role, she oversaw all her previous responsibilities and added new ones that included preparing Canvassing Board meetings, managing personnel, a multimillion-dollar budget and ensuring laws were followed across the entire organization.
In 2020, Marcus was appointed to serve the remaining term of retiring Supervisor Deborah Clark. In 2020, Marcus was elected as Supervisor of Elections and was sworn in on January 5, 2021.
Cybersecurity and election integrity are top priorities of Marcus’ election administration. She spearheaded rapid changes in these domains since elections were designated critical infrastructure by the Department of Homeland Security. Taking an organization-wide and layered approach to strengthen systems, networks and programs, she implemented both physical and cybersecurity policies, technologies and training curricula to protect Pinellas’ electoral processes.
Marcus has improved the accuracy of Pinellas’ voter registration records by initiating advancements in eligibility and address list maintenance programs. She also expanded election transparency by purchasing an auditing system that independently verifies each vote tabulated in 100 percent of the contests and precincts in elections.
Over her 20-year career with the Supervisor of Elections, Marcus has administered more than 300 municipal elections, more than 25 countywide elections, conducted dozens of machine recounts, manual recounts and post-election audits and implemented two new voting systems.
Marcus is a Certified Elections and Registration Administrator (The Election Center and Auburn University) and serves as a member of the association of Florida Supervisors of Elections. Marcus also serves as the Vice Chair of Pinellas County's Business and Technology Board.
Marcus graduated from the University of South Florida where she was President of the National Political Honor Society.