USG Supreme Court Issues Decision to Uphold Election Results

By Rachel O'Brien

A week after the USG Supreme Court suspended the results of the previous week's elections, the court issued a decision on the case, choosing to uphold the election results.

The USG elections that took place on SOLAR Oct. 22 through Oct. 26
ended three hours early, potentially disenfranchising student voters.

Soon after the closing of the polls, a brief was written to the court by a student petitioner, asking the court to invalidate the election because of the early closing of the polls.

Supreme court Chief Justice Andrew Bruskin and two of the five other justices on the court signed a majority opinion, stating that the election did not disenfranchise the petitioner and that the election results were to be followed.

Justices Brown, Bruskin and Weiss signed the majority opinion that sustained election results, while Bruskin also penned a concurring opinion. Justices Borker and Christoulakis dissented, while Justice Harrison abstained from voting.

In the majority opinion Brown wrote: "The premature closing was not intentional, and thus does not represent a violation under Article II Section 3A. Last minute voters are not included in the list of people who cannot be excluded from the vote." He continued, "Furthermore this court has no authority to bring action against the election board itself over the violation of the Election Board By-Laws. Therefore this court decides that the early closure of the polls does not disenfranchise the petitioner."

As a result of the court's decision, a senator who won his race in the election, Senator Matthew Anderson, has announced informally that he will resign. He won his race by a narrow plurality of three votes.

"I recognize the elections were conducted unjustly,” he said at the Nov. 8 senate meeting. “Because I consider this ruling unjust I am hereby resigning.”

The election resulted in a voting down of the proposed constitution, with 30 percent of those voting, 326 students, voting for the proposed constitution. Seventy percent, or 749 voters, voted against the proposal.

Priscilla Novas ran unopposed and won the seat for Health Sciences senator. For the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Matthew Anderson and Sean Moore won the two seats, with Anderson winning 29 percent of the vote and Moore achieving 33 percent of the vote. Oluwole Oweseni obtained ten percent of the vote and Abhilash Matthew got 28 percent of the vote.

Matthew Cho and Demaurey Drummond won the two College of Arts and Sciences seats, with Cho receiving 44 percent of the vote and Drummond receiving 24 percent of the student vote. Candidates Min Ping Mei got 15 percent of the vote and Crystal Ang got 17 percent of the vote.
Kadeem Hylton ran unopposed for freshman representative and won the race. As for Vice President of Academic Affairs, Tae Soo Kim won with 59 percent of the vote, and Franli Guzman obtained 41 percent of the vote.