Charles Nailen/The Hoya Kelley Hampton (SFS ’05) and Luis Torres (COL ’05) won key appeals Saturday.

The GUSA Constitutional Council overturned the results of February’s contested executive election by a 2-1 vote, declaring Kelley Hampton (SFS ’05) and Luis Torres (COL ’05) president- and vice president-elect of the student association.

The council overturned $18 worth of fines imposed against Hampton and Torres, who had been disqualified for exceeding their allotted campaign budget by $4 despite winning the most votes in the contest.

Adam Giblin (SFS ’06) and Eric Lashner (COL ’05) had been declared winners on Feb. 9 by the nine-member Election Commission that runs and certifies all GUSA elections. The commission had assessed fines against all four tickets in the campaign but Hampton and Torres were the only ticket that had enough fines to merit disqualification.

“We are pleased with the decision and with the effort that went into looking into each of the arguments,” Hampton said following the announcement in ICC Galleria Saturday morning.

She and Torres will now begin to form their cabinet and pursue their platform goals.

Torres, however, expressed frustration with the entire election and appeals process, which lasted six weeks. “This should never happen again,” Torres said.

Appeals Continue

Lashner agreed, but for different reasons.

“The Election Commission was too lenient – [Hampton and Torres] should have been disqualified. They should never have been on the ballot,” he said.

Giblin said that he would appeal the decision immediately and the appeal will be co-signed by candidates Josh Green (SFS ’06) and Lauren Butts (SFS ’06), who received third place in the election.

Butts agreed that the election rules had been violated. “We – all the candidates – had access to and were expected to abide by the same set of bylaws,” she said. “After three years of GUSA experience, I would expect Kelley and Luis to know and respect these laws more than any of the candidates.”

According to Giblin, the new appeal will request the disqualification of the Hampton-Torres ticket on grounds of “irreparable harm to the election” as well as for exceeding their budget.

The “irreparable harm” includes tampering with THE HOYA, improper use of the SAC Office, improper use of university property and conducting an e-mail campaign that involved unsolicited e-mails. Giblin said he submitted concrete evidence of the e-mail campaign to the Election Commission, which is expected to rule on the issue shortly.

Election Commissioner Lisa Lombardo (COL ’04) did not respond to requests for comment.

Torres said that he and Hampton are “offended and sad to hear that Adam and Eric have decided to engage in these types of smear politics that do nothing but divide the student body and create tension.”

He held that Giblin and Lashner could not file any appeals, citing the election rules which say, “All complaints shall be filed to the Election Commission no later than 8 p.m. on election day.”

“Adam and Eric cannot manufacture appeals at their whim with complete disregard for time,” he said.

Giblin and Lashner also said they were exasperated that the decision came six weeks after the election because they had already begun working on their campaign goals.

“We’ve been spending hours, about 20 a week, some more in other weeks, in working on our transition,” Giblin said, adding that he and Lashner had already met with top administrators, including Provost James J. O’Donnell and Vice President for Student Affairs Todd Olson.

“Adam and Eric are certainly welcome to appeal should they feel they were treated unfairly by the election commission,” Torres said. “On the other side, however, it is well understood that frivolous appeals will be doing the student body a disservice by drawing this out even further.”

Constitutional Council Chair J.B. Horgan (SFS ’05) said that while the disputed election and lengthy appeals process might have damaged GUSA’s credibility among the student body, he felt the process was necessary.

“[The appeals process] demonstrates the strong democratic basis [of GUSA] when one party can comfortably appeal the results of an election,” he said.

Butts disagreed. “This is the exact reason we ran as GUSA outsiders,” she said. “The student body has not benefited from the past eight weeks of bickering and rule changing that has lead to a lack of new leadership.”

And outgoing GUSA President Brian Morgenstern said that the ongoing appeals have stalled GUSA’s forward progress.

“I’ve been and continue to be uncertain as to how much longer my term and the terms of my appointees will last,” he said. “The unfortunate thing about all of this is that the good work we’ve done this year to improve the image of GUSA by showing positive results may be lost or overshadowed as a result of this long appeals process.”

Fines Overturned

Horgan and Constitutional Council member Kevin Kim (SFS ’05) voted to overturn four fines for $1, $2, $5 and $10 each. Council member Nate Wright (COL ’06) voted with the majority on the $1 and $2 fines, but dissented on the $5 and $10 fines, and the end result of the election.

The council heard arguments from the Election Commission and Hampton and Torres Friday evening after reviewing documents submitted by both parties over the past week and deliberated for five hours Friday evening about the eight fines totaling $41 appealed by the Hampton-Torres ticket.

Three fines, valued at $3, $5 and $10, were upheld. The council was unable to reach a verdict on one fine of $5.

The $10 fine that was overturned, with Wright dissenting, concerned the insertion of campaign flyers into copies of THE HOYA in Village C West.

Hampton and Torres said that they requested permission from the Election Commission for the placement of the flyers, which rebutted THE HOYA’s endorsement of Giblin and Lashner. The Election Commission denied approving the placement of the flyers.

Horgan’s majority opinion said that because there was no proof of either version of the conversation, “the burden of proof must fall upon the Election Commission.”

“The argument that Hampton and Torres are in violation of the bylaws relies upon hearsay by both sides,” Horgan wrote, “but is informed by the fact that upon receiving information that the election commissioner was squarely opposed to the proposition, immediately removed what flyers were placed in THE HOYA.”

Wright, in his dissent, argued that the Election Commission does not have the right to grant permission to place flyers in campus publications in the first place. “While Hampton-Torres contends that consent was given by the Election Commission to distribute the flyer in THE HOYA, the Election Commission has no authorization to give consent to violate District of Columbia law,” Wright wrote.

A $5 fine was overturned, also with Wright dissenting, related to an alleged unsolicited e-mail sent by the Hampton-Torres campaign. According to the GUSA election regulations, candidates may only reply to e-mails sent to them regarding the election and may not initiate contact. In the e-mail in question, there was only evidence as to the reply, not the initiation.

Wright dissented because the Constitutional Council was required to alter the wording of the constitution by changing an “and/or” in the constitution to merely “and” as well as interpret the word “substance.”

“The Election Commission ruled within its discretion that the reported e-mail testimony had enough substance to warrant a violation and precedent would warrant the maximum fine,” Wright said.

The $2 fine was overturned unanimously and related to the misplacement of campaign flyers in Village C East. After instruction from the Election Commission, the Hampton-Torres ticket removed flyers from copies of THE HOYA but did not remove every flyer from every newspaper. The Constitutional Council viewed this as a punitive non-compliance fine, which they interpreted to be beyond the realm of the Election Commission.

The $1 fine was overturned unanimously and related to the placing of a poster in Alumni Square. Hampton and Torres argued that this fine was improperly levied because traditionally posters have been permitted in that location.

The Election Commission, however, said that regardless of tradition, each Election Commission is permitted to interpret the election regulations and make decisions accordingly.

The council disagreed, arguing that tradition had made the practice commonplace and that a warning would have been more appropriate.

The Ruling’s Aftermath

Giblin said he was upset that the council had taken on an active role in striking words from the bylaws.

“They have no power to do that. They can only rule by interpreting the bylaws,” he said. “The assembly is in charge of amending bylaws.”

Horgan, however, argued that the council maintained the authority to strike, but not add, the bylaws without the assembly’s approval.

Responding to this, Torres said, “The Constitutional Council overturned a specific fine in light of the Election Commission’s failure to meet the burden of proof, not in light of their recommendation to strike certain words from the bylaws. These are two separate issues.”

Giblin also argued that despite the presence of evidence and testimony from the Election Commission, the Constitutional Council chose to ignore the evidence.

“The Constitutional Council, through [Saturday’s] ruling, has labeled prominent members of the Senior Class as nothing better than petty liars,” he said.

If Giblin and Lashner’s appeal to the Election Commission is rejected, the assembly will certify the election with Hampton and Torres as the winners. But if the commission approves of the harsher fines, then Hampton and Torres can appeal that result to the Constitutional Council once again.

“We followed the bylaws to the letter, being fined solely for the half-banners in windows – though based on [Saturday’s] ruling this is now allowed. How have we been rewarded for our clean campaign?” Gilbin said. “We’ve been told that we should have cheated.”

He also said he was upset that two of three fines for tampering with the newspapers had been voided. “According to the Constitutional Council, cheaters win. Screw federal copyright law. Screw D.C. law.”

Torres said that the Constitutional Council had significantly addressed the issues and that it was now time to move on.

“Emotions are high and individuals have political interests to protect,” Torres said. “It is a given that there will be times when people may disagree with some of the [Constitutional Council’s] decisions but, it is important that we respect their legitimate authority and reasoned judgments in these highly complex matters.”