The ASUO Constitution Court approved a request from ASUO President Sam Dotters-Katz’s to issue a motion for a clarification for the upcoming ASUO elections process on Tuesday night, and granted Dotters-Katz permission to appoint Constitution Court member Pat Chaney as the new ASUO Elections Board Coordinator.
Chaney was the Elections Board Coordinator during the 2013 ASUO elections.
Chaney has denied to comment at this time.
Dotters-Katz’s motion for clarification to appoint a new Elections Board Coordinator comes after the entire Elections Board resigned on Friday, due to the University of Oregon’s administration’s overruling of an ASUO decision to disqualify presidential candidate Ben Bowman from the ASUO elections. The decision was made after presidential candidate Thomas Tullis filed a grievance against Bowman, citing intimidation and bribery. The administration also ruled to delay the elections to April 14.
The Dotters-Katz rejected administrative intervention, and is planning to appoint Chaney to the position in order to continue with the elections outside of administrative interference.
“If confirmed, Pat (Chaney) would take a leave of absence from the Court, and would not participate in any matters with the Court until he is done as Elections Chair,” Dotters-Katz said. “Pat served in this position last year, and has the knowledge and experience necessary to run these elections right now.”
When Chaney was the Elections Board Coordinator last year, he faced a similar situation with the UO Administration intervening on the elections. During the 2013 elections, the ASUO Constitution Court withheld the election results in order to take time to review a grievance that was filed by Ducks For a Difference Campaign Manager Andrew Rogers against the United Oregon campaign, which was Dotters-Katz’s slate. The grievance was filed on the grounds of bribing students for their vote in exchange for United Oregon T-shirts.
The administration intervened by ruling that the ASUO elections results needed to be released, citing that the ASUO elections are not subject to Oregon law.
If Chaney is appointed, he will then make his appointments to fill out the remainder of the board, and the ASUO Senate will either approve or not approve them during their senate meetings in the coming weeks. Until the appointments are made, the Constitution Court will be in charge of reviewing any elections grievances that are filed.
Voting is still planned to commence on April 14.