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Welcome, 'President' Dowd
In the past five years, GUSA has held three disputed presidential elections, a track record that places the student association roughly on par with Libya, Pakistan and — we shudder to think — Florida.
It’s true, though. In 2004, the Election Commission disqualified the winning candidate, Kelley Hampton (SFS ’05), for serious violations of its election bylaws, only to reinstate her after two frustrating months of appeals. Then in 2006, Twister Murchison (SFS ’08) became president even though he finished seven percentage points behind his opponent, who was disqualified for a violation of the supposedly improved election bylaws.
This year’s election debacle was easily the biggest, however, because this time, there were no bylaw violations. There was no foul play. Against all odds, GUSA pulled off something that it can apparently only do two-fifths of the time: a valid election.
Following the rules of instant runoff voting, D.W. Cartier (COL ’09) emerged as the winner.
But at the urging of the Election Commission, the GUSA Senate — that bastion of public integrity — threw out the results of that election and ordered a new one. Citing widespread confusion over the rules of instant runoff voting, the commission and the senate decided that the results were invalid. Not totally invalid, of course, since it still barred the bottom four candidates from the runoff election, but still invalid enough to deny Cartier the office he had rightfully won.
So, after doing a woefully inadequate job communicating the rules of instant runoff voting to students, the Election Commission decided that the student body couldn’t possibly have made an informed decision the first time around and cavalierly overruled their decision.
We take little solace in knowing that the runoff election ultimately led to the victory of Patrick Dowd (SFS ’09) and James Kelly (COL ’09), the least bad candidates in the field (the best one can hope for in GUSA). However one felt about his platform, Cartier was the clear and unequivocal winner of last month’s election and would be president right now were it not for the Election Commission’s indefensible decision to change the rules in the middle of the game. Now, Dowd becomes the second president in three years to take office in spite of losing a presidential election.
There’s little use in railing against that electoral injustice, however, since it’s unlikely to ever be rectified. Instead, we’d like to offer some suggestions that might begin to curb the unmitigated incompetence and open corruption that have unfortunately become a cornerstone of GUSA elections.
First, GUSA must lengthen the election season to give candidates at least three weeks to campaign. The stunted election campaign doesn’t give the most promising candidates a chance to rise above the rest of the field. In a crowded year like this one, students more often than not end up voting for the one candidate whose name they recognize.
Second, if future campaigns are likely to be as crowded as this one, GUSA should institute primary elections. The first two weeks of the campaign would be devoted to the primary, and only candidates who receive 15 percent or more should advance to the final election a week later. This will separate the wheat from the chaff and allow for a more thoughtful debate between serious candidates.
Finally, and most importantly, GUSA must reform the way it chooses its Election Commissioner. Right now, the previous year’s Senior Class Committee appoints the Communications Chair, who also serves as the Election Commissioner. But that committee does little that would qualify its members to run elections and only about 10 percent of the duties of the Communications Chair — according to the current occupant of that job, Maura Cassidy (COL ’08) — is GUSA-related. Most of that committee’s job description is reserved for party planning and fundraising. Turn the responsibility over to a group of students under the advising of a professor or teaching assistant in the government department, and cut back on electoral illegitimacy.
As we have said before, GUSA may be a lost cause. But it will never claw its way into a dignified position on campus if it can’t even hold fair elections half the time. Let’s hope Pat Dowd is the last president whose name goes down in the record books with an asterisk next to it.
I'm continually shocked by the Hoya editorial board's 1.) ability to get it factually wrong and 2.) arrogance in expressing an opinion in the complete absence of facts or even cursory research.
I don't know how the Hoya can state that DW was the "clear" winner of the election when no member of the editorial board was at the meeting where the results were presented, or actually looked at the ballots, as about 50 people did. The Election Commission, 23 student senators, the outgoing president and vice president, and all of the candidates looked at the ballots in depth and agreed that no "clear winner" had emerged. The person who ended up winning was originally placed fourth and continued to be losing until the 8th round of balloting when they won by only a few dozen votes. Meanwhile, when you looked at the ballots cast in the later round, there was an incredible number of ballots that cast their votes alphabetically -- voted for one or two candidates, and then just ran down the ballot alphabetically listing the rest. In those cases, using a reasonable person standard, it was impossible to determine "voter intent," the most important responsibility of the ballot counter. We can, and did, quantify how that affected the result.
The Hoya's ed board forgot that we could actually look at the ballots, we could actually determine statistically how much that was a factor. The EC reported that there were many ballots cast that way, and that the alphabetical correlation was so high that it distorted the results of the election. I'm sure if you gave me a few hours I could find more students who voted that way than DW's margin of victory in the first vote. Hell, three of my roommates voted that way and reported to me how pissed they were that their votes were accidentally going to end up somewhere they didn't want them.
The Senate then did exactly what its by-laws empowered and required it to do: when the result of the election is, by consensus, unclear, we hold a runoff vote. In this case absolutely no one who saw the ballots would ever think to call the results "clear," including all of the candidates, including DW. As DW has stated multiple times, he was completely in support for the runoff vote, although he had a few disagreements with the actual timing of it. (Concerns such as turnout ended up being irrelevant since the runoff vote set a turnout record.)
I'm very proud that the candidates all ran excellent campaigns and did not violate any of the (much simplified) election rules. However, Senate certification exists NOT as a check on the candidates -- only the EC has the ability to disqualify them for the rules. Senate certification exists to guarantee the validity of the election as a whole, and to make sure that the student voice was heard. In this case it was not problems with the candidates that precipitated the result, it was problems with the ballot (which the Senate objected to during the election) and the application of IRV (that expressly denied our wishes by forcing people to rank all the candidates). Not only was the first vote held against our by-laws and objections, but it clearly mangled voter intent, frustrated people (evidenced by the high volume of complaint emails that the EC got during the election), and failed to produce anything near resembling a "clear winner." The runoff vote clearly demonstrated the will of the students, so unless that will changed unfavorably AGAINST the candidate who had "won" the first vote, it seems to me that the results of the runoff completely vindicate the decision of the Senate and produced a clear winner. DW, interestingly, did better in the first rounds of the runoff vote, moving from fourth place to third.
The Hoya should have 1.) actually looked at the data before writing this editorial and 2.) done any research into how and why the Student Senate certifies or denies certification to election results, since it clearly does not understand what the purpose of that vote is. The irony of all this is that this is by far the least of "election scandals" that has occurred recently. In fact, we don't even see it as a scandal, since everything went exactly according to the rules and intentions, and, though the Hoya may not realize it from its offices high in the Leavey Center, down here on the ground students are very happy about it.
I don't care, though. Asking the Hoya to write a worthwhile editorial recently is like asking a dog not to drool. If the Senate had certified the results, I have no doubt that today we'd be reading, "Welcome 'President' Cartier," with the ed board railing against how the Senate failed in its duty to make sure that the election represented the student will, and excoriating us for certifying such obviously flawed results.
Hah.
I will start off by letting you know that I think this is a terrible editorial, and it issues an opinion that clearly involves little to no research or facts whatsoever.
You invalidate your entire point in the very beginning of the editorial - you say that the election was re-done just "at the urging of the Election Commission, the GUSA Senate — that bastion of public integrity," and that the election was "Following the rules of instant runoff voting."
Sadly, as is all too common with your Editorial Board, you have gotten the facts wrong. The election did not follow the rules of IRV, as you would know if you had done any research on it, because in real IRV voters can choose not to rank a given candidate if they don't want to. They can rank as many or as few as they like.
That's why there was a runoff. I'm sorry you don't get much of a scathing conspiracy-theory story out of it, but that's the truth.
You disappoint me, Ed Board. I really would like to support your push for independence in the pursuit of "Journalistic Integrity," but first, please, let's see some journalistic integrity.
-GUSA Senator
Disappointed by The Hoya
What does GUSA do for our student body?
I have not recalled a change GUSA has done in the past 4 years.
GUSA is just like an elementary classroom. You pick a president and
at the end, is just make-believe.
Someone wants to counterattack my point? (someone not in GUSA preferrably)
As one of the former candidates, I agree that primaries are completely necessary. We are going to work to reform the necessary By Laws this weekend. But I have to say once again that GUSA has been responsible for countless changes and improvements at Georgetown over the past few years. I am tired of the Hoya's Editorial Board's insistence on being part of the problem, rather than part of the solution.
GUSA's Student Commission for Unity is also leading the charge researching and advocating for solutions to re-connect Georgetown's many different communities that suffer from self segregation on campus. The Ed Board conveniently overlooked that information when endorsing candidates. Perhaps if they hadn't forgotten to interview Kyle and I, they might have done decent work as reporters with legitimate opinions. But, we need to stop scapegoating each other and get to work, mobilizing for change. When the Hoya's Editorial Board stops talking and starts working, and encouraging apathetic Hoyas to get involved on campus, then I think their words would be worth listening to.
I know Hoya reporters are not supposed to be directly involved or invested in other Student Groups that they report on, but it can't hurt them to attend meetings and feel the pulse of the campus. I'm tired of having my name slandered in interviews, being misquoted, unattributed and discredited for putting in hours of work every day to advocate for students and to have baseless assaults on my organizations efforts. We need more dedicated students though, and the Hoya effectively turns away motivated and active students from getting engaged in GUSA, which has exceptionaly potential for affecting change.
So finally, I ask that everyone become part of the solution, not part of the problem. I'm trying. Dedicated Senators are trying and I do believe Pat Dowd is trying. What are you doing to improve our community?
GUSA and the football team should go down together. We wouldn't miss either of them!
At least the Ed Board finally offers some thoughtful tips for improving the elections. I'm sure the Senate will take them up for review. It's just a shame they can't inject any help without first laying on the usual baseless tripe thick ('open corruption'? 'clear and unequivocal winner'?) - it just lessens the credibility of the paper, which is already, well, paper-thin.
I really can't believe I am reading another op-ed piece that the Editorial Board has written. Please be a positive force on this campus, you do absolutely no good by tearing apart the Georgetown U Student Association. Thank you, at least, for making some suggestions this time as to what the Student Association can do to make the process better. However, I believe it is completely unjustified and shameless that you choose to write articles discrediting both the Election Commissioner, and the few students have chosen to attempt to make Georgetown a better place. At this point, who benefits when you say that Pat Dowd is the least bad candidate? What exactly is the Editorial Board trying to accomplish with this completely negative article?
Ok, Ok, Ok just chill everyone. For wanting to bash The Hoya so much for criticizing GUSA you all have proven yourselves just as hypocritical by engaging in what you all say The Hoya has done and should not do. I take the editorial as constructive criticism from The Hoya and I want to personally thank The Hoya because it seems they have the TRUE capability of enacting progressive change on campus.
How? For one besides you GUSA crackpots, not many people spend their time attacking The Hoya, and many rely on it to deliver the news and reflections from Gtown students, even those who disagree with them..Dale.
Secondly, more people trust and believe in The Hoya, than slimy wanna be politicians who simply treat GUSA as another bullet on their resume and also rally around it (GUSA) because they are under this illusion it is some great Democracy worthy of a Philosophy book. Please, if anything or any organization will get anything done, it is The Hoya and The Hoya alone. People read it and people respond to it, positively and negatively and therefore that makes it the true reflection of the student body.
NOT an ineffective student-government. GUSA should be disbanded and a new student government should be constructed.
One angry Hoya who DOES NOT write for The Hoya
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