To help foster a (hopefully) more informed student body for this year’s Georgetown University Student Association Senate Elections, Vox invited all candidates to complete a short questionnaire regarding their candidacies. And, to our surprise, some of them even responded!
The election is scheduled for this Thursday, although the exact 24-hour voting period is dependent on when the e-mail from the University goes out to students. Students are allowed to vote in their respective districts and for the at-large positions. If your district is sans a candidate, or you do not want to vote for the candidates listed, write-ins are allowed.
Today, we’re covering the candidates from the Class of 2014. Check back tomorrow for the rest of the candidates.
In a solid victory over runners-up Matt Wagner (SFS ’11) and Emmanuel Hampton (COL ’11) and two other tickets, Georgetown University Student Association President Calen Angert (MSB ’11) and Vice President Jason Kluger (MSB ’11) have won reelection to the GUSA executive, student Election Commissioners report.
Angert and Kluger won in the first round, but since votes were close, Election Commissioners said, results were run to round two.
In a separate victory, this year’s GUSA Election does not appear to have involved the kind of catastrophes that have marred several previous elections, including trouble with instant run-off voting in 2008, and the adamantly protested, last-minute disqualification of two tickets in last year’s election.
Sam Ungar (COL ’12), the Georgetown University Student Association parliamentarian, said in an e-mail that today’s election may have had the highest turnout of any GUSA election to date:
“Assuming an undergraduate population near 7,092 (the 2008-09 enrollment, which is the last publicly available figure on the University’s website),” he writes, “we had a turnout of approximately 44 percent in this election. It is believed that this is a new record turnout for a GUSA Presidential election, beating the previous record by some 500 votes—I will be working to confirm this over the next few days.”
Below is a graph Ungar compiled with data from the Election Commission, which is expected to release the results of the election at 11 p.m. tomorrow. So far, says Election Commissioner, there have been no major problems with voting.
Since the numbers are a little hard to read, here’s a quick breakdown (Speaker Adam Talbot tells Vox that you have to guesstimate times):
1,500 around 10:30 p.m. last night … 2,070 votes around 2 a.m. this morning
It’s Georgetown University Student Association election day, all day!
The polls close at 11:59 p.m. tonight, and vote counting will take place all day tomorrow. Student Election Commissioners have said that ideally, they will disclose the results of today’s GUSA Presidential Election to the winners of the election, GUSA Speaker Adam Talbot (COL ’12), Parliamentarian Sam Ungar (COL ’12), and campus media Wednesday night at 11:00 p.m.
But we know you want to know how your ticket is doing now. So, take our poll: who did you vote for today?
“He’s got the most shit in there … he’s got the warmest shit … and he’s got a fuckin’ ice table,” quoth a drunk student at a Village A rooftop party, where GUSA executive candidates Arman Ismail (COL’11) and Tucker Stafford (COL ’12) seem to have filmed most of their second campaign video.
In a message from the “Arman Ismail and Tucker Stafford for GUSA 2010″ Facebook group, Stafford explained, “This is a new short vid shot just to keep the good times rolling and to remind everyone to keep spreading the word as elections are on this Tuesday Feb 23rd!”
And to remind everyone to “vote for the big sexy,” of course.
In case you missed it when we added it on to our post about Ismail and Stafford’s first video, GUSA alum Matt Stoller (COL ’08) also tipped us off to the existence of a video of Ismail doing a delightful impression of Heath Ledger’s Joker.
To break-up a very GUSA-heavy day, Vox has a video for all you folks who don’t give a hoot about the Georgetown University Student Association or their elections.
If you even bother to open the e-mail with the your ballot in it tomorrow—or if you don’t care to rank anyone else after the candidate you want to elect—we’re guessing this is who you’ll vote for.
A little late out of the gate, President Calen Angert (MSB ’11) and Vice President Jason Kluger (MSB ’11), who are running for reelection in Tuesday’s Georgetown University Student Association for President and VP, have posted their campaign video.
Their video, complete with outtakes, features “Eye of the Tiger,” slap fights, role playing, an endorsement by two men’s basketball players (they’re getting real political this season, aren’t they?) and no rap. Enjoy!
Unbeknownst to most students, last Tuesday, a special election took place to fill a vacancy in the Georgetown University Student Association Senate. With 76 votes, Andrew Foley (MSB ’10) beat out David Lee (NHS ’10), who had 63 votes, for the off-campus seat that Senator Josh Mogil (SFS ’11) vacated when he went abroad.
And, all things considered, Foley is lucky to have won. Lee’s strong showing appears to have been the result of a joke write-in campaign organized by his friends and roommates, including Nick Calta (COL ’10). (At least Lee didn’t win—last year, students elected two joke candidates to the Senate.)
“I’m Nick and I live with David. My roommates and I (not including David) have decided that he should win the GUSA Senate Special Election happening today,” Calta wrote in an e-mail. “We all agree that based on our experience of living with him for the past 8 months or so, he is a perfect candidate for this position.”
Calta then listed a few promises he expected Lee to make if elected, like “[eating] gummi bears at every meeting (assorted flavors)” and “[throwing] said gummi bears at people he disagrees with.” [Disclosure: David Lee is the former business manager for the Georgetown Voice.]
Senator Andrew Foley was also the beneficiary of a last-minute disqualification of his only other official opponent. The opponent? Recent Georgetown grad and former Georgetown Heckler editor Jack Stuef (COL ’09), who successfully signed up to run in the election. Stuef campaigned undisturbed by election officials for two days despite having graduated in December, living 500-or-so miles away in Michigan, and Tweeting profusely about his campaign on a Twitter feed followed by several Senators.
Read Calta’s full letter and check out a chronicle of Stuef’s campaign after the jump!
Arman Ismail (COL ‘11) and Tucker Stafford’s (COL ‘12) aren’t the only GUSA candidates with a seriously entertaining campaign video—candidates Matt Wagner (SFS ’11) and Emmanuel Hampton (COL ’11) have been busy too. And yeah, theirs is a rap.
Complete with backup dancers, abrupt cutaways around campus, and an awkwardly jiving Wagner, “Damn it Feels Good to be a Hoya” video pretty much made our day. We’re not going to say much else—just that we’re pleasantly surprised by the video quality.
If GUSA presidential election season were like the Christmas season—and it’s not—GUSA candidate surveys would be like family togetherness, and GUSA campaign videos would be like presents. The former are nice, the latter, delightful.
Nothing will ever meet the awesomeness of former GUSA executives Ben Shaw (COL ’08) and Matt Appenfeller’s (COL ’08) “Vote in a Box” video or the goofiness of David Dietz (COL ‘10) and Tyler Stone’s (COL ‘09) “GEORGET OWN IT“, but we’re amused nonetheless by Arman Ismail (COL ’11) and Tucker Stafford’s (COL ’12) “Believe 2010.” Vox hopes there are more videos to come.
Vox Populi is the staff blog of the Georgetown Voice, Georgetown University's weekly newsmagazine. Opinions expressed in posts are those of their author alone unless otherwise stated.
To help foster a (hopefully) more informed student body for this year’s Georgetown University Student Association Senate Elections, Vox invited all candidates to complete a short questionnaire regarding their candidacies. And, to our surprise, some of them even responded!
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