UC Santa Barbara’s Associated Students Elections Board has extended voting for spring 2022-23 elections until Sunday, April 24.
The voter threshold for Associated Students (A.S.) elections is 20% of the student body. A.S. Elections Board has not yet announced today’s voter turnout, but said in a statement to the Nexus yesterday that if voter turnout was not met by today’s 4 p.m. deadline, the voting deadline could be extended.
As of Wednesday afternoon, 11% of undergraduates and 11.88% of graduate students had voted.
As of 7 p.m., A.S. Elections Board has not reported today’s turnout.
This year’s A.S. elections saw low voter turnout throughout the week. Voting opened on Monday, with a 2.44% undergraduate and 4.31% graduate student turnout. On Tuesday, 5.67% of undergraduate and 6.65% graduate students voted.
This year’s election also saw low candidate turnout — with only 20 candidates running for Senate and one candidate running for three of five executive positions.
The low turnout comes as A.S. works to internally phase out the party system, with a constitutional amendment on the elections ballot to abolish party affiliations for senatorial and Internal Vice President candidates. This change, which has historically brought down voter turnout at other schools, has raised questions from UCSB’s Elections Board about voter turnout.
these AS kids will blame covid, party system, on-campus class, literally ANYTHING before they just admit that no one gives a fuck about AS because it’s worthless lmao
Come on man. AS exists for kids to fulfill their fantasies as fake authority and pack their resumes! It is definitely not useless man just like garbage is still useful to flies!!!