In a remarkably close primary election for ASUO Executive, Maddy Melton and Eddy Morales edged out Christa Shively and Greg Bae on Friday night by only 21 votes out of 2,257 cast in the race. Several ASUO election insiders predict campaigning for the general election will be nothing short of intense.
“Generals are going to be extremely hot and heavy,” said Megan Hughes, a member of the campaign team for Melton and Morales.
Shively said she was proud of the campaign she and Bae have run so far, and she is looking forward to the general election.
The primary results identified, for the most part, the two tickets that will compete in the general election, to be held April 21 through 23. In the few cases where one candidate won more than 50 percent of the vote, they were elected outright and will not appear on the general election ballot.
In the finance senator positions, Adrian Gilmore and Alyce Chong garnered the most votes in the race for ASUO Programs Finance Committee Senate Seat 1, while Mena Ravassipour and Joe Jenkins are going on to compete for PFC Senate Seat 2 in the general election, and Beth Overgard and Colin Andries are the top two remaining candidates for PFC Senate Seat 3. Chong is the only incumbent PFC senator who will be advancing to the general election.
Two EMU Board Finance Senate seats are up for grabs, and Gabe V. Kjos and Rodrigo Moreno Villamar will compete for Senate Seat 4 in the generals. James George was elected to EMU Board Senate Seat 6 because he received more than 50 percent of the votes in that race.
Three Athletic Department Finance Committee seats were on the ballot. For Senate Seat 7, Andrew Faust and Laura Schulthies will be in the generals, Anthony Kuchulis and Jesse Harding will compete for Senate Seat 8 and for Senate Seat 9, Kevin Day won the position outright with more than 50 percent of the votes.
ASUO Elections Coordinator Andrea Hall said she and the rest of the ASUO Elections Board were thrilled with the 15.2 percent voter turnout, or 2,634 total votes cast, in the primary election. While 15.2 percent might not sound like a large portion of students, officials consider it an admirable level of participation. She added she was glad to see that students from groups that usually have little student government involvement ran for positions in the ASUO.
“The presence of so many greek students, law students and many others, added a lot of character to the elections so far,” Hall said. “Those students running has reached out to a lot of groups that oftentimes the ASUO is accused of neglecting or not appealing to.”
In the other races, Rebecca Shively has been elected as an uncontested candidate to Senate Seat 11, an academic seat for undeclared majors, because no write-in candidates received enough votes to challenge her.
There were no candidates for Senate Seat 12, the academic senator for Architecture and Allied Arts, so someone will be appointed to this position at a later date.
Stefan Myers will be campaigning against Alicia Lindquist for the Arts & Letters/Journalism Senate Seat 13 in the general election.
With Jordan Marx a clear first-place winner, and Adam Turcott and Kevin Curtin tying for second place, all three will be on the ballot in the general election for Social Science Senate Seat 15.
Jonah Lee and Gabrielle Guidero beat out the other candidates for Science Senate Seat 16 in the primaries, and Bethany Larson won Business Senate Seat 17 outright with more than 50 percent of the vote.
James Jensen, who ran uncontested, is the new senator for Graduate/Law Senate Seat 18.
Nick Hudson and Sarah Koski will be on the general election ballot for the two-year position on the Associated Students Presidential Advisory Council (ASPAC), but Jonathan Kloor, who ran uncontested, won the two-year midterm seat outright.
Courtney Warner won one of the three two-year positions for the Student Recreation Center Advisory Board with 1,036 of 1,111 votes. Jonah Lee and Noah Glusman, both write-in candidates who met the requirement to advance to the generals, will be on the ballot for the remaining two seats. However, ASUO election rules state that a candidate can only run for one position in the general election, so Lee, who made generals for both Senate Seat 16 and the rec center board position, will have to make a decision about which position he wants to run for.
Joe Snyder won the one-year ASUO Programs Finance Committee At-Large position outright because he was uncontested. The status of the two-year midterm position is unclear, however, as Toby Piering had more votes than sole opponent Cory Phillips, but both were listed as advancing to the general election. The Emerald was unable to confirm the outcome of this race with the elections board.
Ethan Firpo was the only candidate running for the two EMU Board At-Large two-year terms, and he won the position outright. The two-year midterm seat, however, is between Slade Leeson and Omid Kianersi for the general election.
Adam Amato and Cory Phillips both received the most votes as write-ins for two-year terms on the Building Fee Committee, and each won a seat outright because no one ran on the ballot and no other write-ins met the minimum number to go to the generals.
Except for Ballot Measure 15, which was voided because of incorrect wording, all ballot measures passed with more than 50 percent “yes” votes. Measure 15 and another measure — which was submitted to and approved by the Constitution Court but did not get put on the ballot on DuckWeb — will both be on the general ballot.
Kira Park is a freelance writer for the Emerald.