The Associated Students Senate voted Saturday to hold a Winter Quarter 2019 special election for the External Vice President for Statewide Affairs position.

The vote, conducted over email, passed with 9 yeses, 3 nos and 1 abstention, with only half of the 24 senators having voted. Internal Vice President Steven Ho sent out the results on Monday.

The petition was discussed at Senate during senate’s last fall quarter meeting by John Paul Renteria.  Sanya Kamidi / Daily Nexus

The Senate previously voted to indefinitely table the petition after the fall quarter special election failed to meet the 16 percent voting threshold, when only 10.53 percent of the student body voted.

The winter quarter special election is scheduled to conclude on Jan. 24 and will have an eight percent voting threshold. This number is halved from the fall quarter special election.

It is unclear whether or not Elections Board will release an updated schedule for the special election, given that interested candidates were to “declare their candidacy the Friday before winter quarter starts.”

Elections Board Chair John Paul Renteria did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

The board initially planned on a 10 percent voter threshold, which Renteria previously said to the Senate he believed was achievable.

The board also included a clause in the petition stating that if the threshold is not met by the original deadline, the election will be extended to Feb. 10.

The deadline for the fall quarter special election was extended three times in an attempt to meet the threshold before the seat was left vacant.

Madeline Loudon, the EVPSA runner-up in the Spring 2018 election, was the only candidate running in the fall quarter special election. Elections Board previously said that they believed that the 16 percent threshold was partially unachievable because it was a single-candidate, single-position race.

Sanya Kamidi and Evelyn Spence can be reached at news@dailynexus.com.

Print

Sanya Kamidi
Sanya Kamidi serves as the Deputy News Editor and before that was a Social Media Manager. Loves coffee and will find any excuse to miss class for the Nexus. She can be reached at skamidi@dailynexus.com or @skamidi on Twitter.
Evelyn Spence
Evelyn Spence harbors a great love for em dashes and runs on nothing but iced coffee, Jolly Ranchers and breaking news. She serves as the managing editor and can be reached at evelyn@dailynexus.com, managing@dailynexus.com or at @evelynrosesc on Twitter.