Two student body presidential candidates will face an election runoff tomorrow through Thursday after original election results as well as a supreme court ruling deemed them necessary.
Presidential candidates Juwan Greene and Phill Lund are facing off after receiving the highest percentage of votes. None of the original four candidates received the 50 percent needed to sweep the presidency.
In addition, a recent supreme court ruling played a role in the runoff. The decision to overturn the disqualification of ‘The New Deal’ ticket left Greene available for the presidency.
The decision made by student justices was overturned by the deans on the supreme court because the penalty of disqualification was seen as “too harsh,” according to Election Commissioners Cassidy Lane and Marshall Herklotz.
“I stand by our decision that we made,” Herklotz said. “The reason it was overturned was because they said the punishment was too severe, but we considered the punishment after we decided they were guilty, and with only two hours left in the election, if we didn’t disqualify them, anything else we decided wouldn’t have affected them.”
Since the decision was overturned, Greene and his ticket are once again eligible for election.
Elections begin tomorrow via university email accounts, and according to Lund, the work has not stopped.
“When I learned about the initial election results, I can’t lie, I was a little excited and really happy that so many people believed in my ideas,” Lund said. “That being said, I knew that just because I got the most votes that it was not over and I still had a lot of work ahead of me.”
Greene did not comment by press time.
Candidates for election
President: Senator Phill Lund and Candidate Juwan Greene
Vice President: University Affairs Chief Jacqueline Bolden and Candidate Wylie Manson
Secretary: Candidate Cara Goetz and Senator Melinda Perez
Treasurer: Senator Gregory Curatola and Senator Drew Carson
Chief of Staff: Senator Lesly Garcia and Candidate Brianna Carter