Dr. Clara Belle Wheeler is a senior fellow with the Virginia Institute for Public Policy. She is also a retired surgeon and former member of the Virginia State Board of Elections.

Born and raised in Charlottesville, Virginia, Clare Belle is a graduate of Hollins College and the Medical College of Virginia. Following medical school, she completed her residency at Harvard Combined Orthopaedic Surgery in Boston, Massachusetts and a fellowship at the Curtis National Hand Institute in Baltimore, Maryland. With more than four decades of medicine under her belt, Clara Belle primarily practiced medicine in Fredericksburg, Virginia, with a brief few years in Boise, Idaho.

Widely considered one of the foremost experts on Virginia’s electoral process and systems, Clara Belle previously served as the vice-chair of the Virginia State Board of Elections and a past chairman and secretary of the Albemarle County Electoral Board. She was also previously the western district chairman, on the board of directors, and on the legislative committee for the Virginia Electoral Board Association. She has also served as a poll watcher, election officer, chief election official, and worked with Virginia Voter’s Alliance.

Clara Belle makes her home in Charlottesville, where she has a small farm and local business. She joined the Virginia Institute team in 2021.