By Jennifer Baik
Assistant News Editor
Competition is a vital part of life, but has it gone too far this past week among candidates running for student government?
According to members on SGA’s election panel, there have been incidents reported to the General Judicial Council during campaigning week that involved alleged abuses of campaign rules such as the disappearance or tearing down of candidate posters, rumors being spread, mass e-mails sent out about a certain candidate to the public, and false accusations directed toward another individual during speeches.
Although nothing has been officially submitted, there have been complaints made to the GJC by some of the candidates expressing their concerns about such mudslinging tactics. The GJC did discuss these issues within the council but no action has been taken since there hasn’t been enough evidence and since the issues were too ambiguous to be considered serious.
“In my opinion, there are questionable things going on in this campaign,” said presidential candidate Paris Dennard.” “I think it’s hard for me to sit here and see how a lot of things that are going on are really challenging people’s integrity.”
“When you’re running a campaign and members of the executive board are also running parts of the election (such as counting the ballots, running election booths and approving documents) and running in the election at the same time, there’s a conflict of interest,” Dennard said.
Election chairperson Phil Vaughn did confirm that posters have been taken down and rumors have been spread but in turn said that the complaints given by other candidates to the GJC have been unnecessarily escalated.
“A large part of what’s going on right now is blowing things out of proportion to get sympathy,” Vaughn said. “To point fingers at somebody is just wrong because there is no mass scandal going on and there is no evidence to back up claims accusing certain individuals.”
Lee Diaz, a junior class senator running for president, said that there has been an increase in competition this semester but concluded that mudslinging was not the word to describe the instances occurring during the election process.
“Not everybody is going to be happy with me saying that we need to take a different direction because it’s a different perspective on leadership,” Diaz said. “I’ve tried my hardest to keep away from mudslinging although my perspective on the future of SGA might be taken as offensive, my personal opinion is mine, and it’s an expression of my passion for this organization.”
Diaz also said that his main focus was to reach all students by creating an outreach community so that it can give every student the opportunity to voice his opinions, something SGA has yet to do.
“SGA has to change our focus on you,” said Diaz during his speech on Wednesday. “We simply have not been reaching out enough.”
Sophomore senator Nicole Flowers, who is running for SGA secretary, claimed that one of the members from the e-board told her that she “should work on her character.” According to Flowers, things were blown out of proportion during this election and things were said that shouldn’t have been said in the presence of others.
“It’s not a big deal,” Flowers said. “We all wanted to win, but I am not running to have someone tread on my name because I am above that and that’s not how I run myself.”
Ben Veenendaal, a senior SGA treasurer graduating this semester, specifically pointed out that there were two candidates who were mudslinging during the campaign but did not wish to reveal their names for The Graphic. Veenendaal concluded that the reason for such conduct is fierce competition this year among the candidates.
“There was a certain individual who talked trash and threw mud on the entire e-board when he was making speeches this past week to some organizations, and there was another candidate making unconstructive comments about her opponent to other people around her,” Veenendaal said. “Maybe they’re lacking confidence, because I don’t know why they would attack another person to build themselves up.”
March 21, 2002