After the disqualification of a presidential candidate, results from this week’s Associated Students of NMU (ASNMU) election for president and vice president will not count. Elections will now take place next week for president and vice president; votes for representatives will stand.
ASNMU presidential candidate Ben Stanley allegedly broke eight ASNMU election rules and was disqualified on Monday, April 4 from running for ASNMU president. These infractions included illegal postings of campus literature, canvassing of residential halls without approval and not following Center for Student Enrichment guidelines.
He said that he would appeal with the All-Student Judiciary (ASJ). The appeal occurred Wednesday, April 6 at 3 p.m., and ASJ upheld five of the eight complaints. Three infractions are grounds for disqualification, and Stanley is no longer allowed to run for president.
“From here we are having a revote, for just the presidential and vice presidential candidates and that will occur the same time next week, Tuesday (April 12) at 12:01 a.m. to Wednesday (April 13) at 6 p.m.” said Mitch Foster, head of the elections committee.
Foster said that students were not notified sooner about the infractions and possible disqualification because it was impossible to remove him from the ballot and the Election Committee did not want to hurt his chances in case his appeal was granted.
Polling stations will not be open as they were this week: only online voting will be available for students. For the votes that already took place for presidential and vice presidential candidates, no numbers will be recorded. All representative votes were recorded and will not be included in next week’s votes; all candidates ran uncontested.
“The reason this ordeal occurred is because there are rules set in place for ASNMU, and in order for the organization itself to be considered legitimate by students it has to be upheld for all students. As the election committee, we have to take those complaints very seriously,” Foster said.
ASNMU vice president, Kyle Brock, insisted that it’s important students know that when a person decides to run for ASNMU, they sign an agreement that they will follow certain rules. With that in mind, students should expect that the committee will uphold those rules.
Foster added that these problems brought to light problems within the election packet.
“With these issues occurring, we feel as though this has brought about some issues for the elections packet and the election bylaws in the future, and they will be looked at by the new executive board this summer and next year,” Foster said.
