Update: Bowman plans on appealing the Elections Board’s ruling.
Editor’s Note: Ben Bowman was the Emerald’s Opinion Editor earlier this year. He no longer works for the Emerald.
The ASUO Elections Board ruled on Thursday night to disqualify Ben Bowman and ASUO Freshman Representative Emily Wu from the 2014 ASUO elections ballot. The ruling comes from the grievance that was filed against Bowman and Wu by ASUO presidential candidate Thomas Tullis.
On Friday, Bowman said that he will be appealing the Elections Board’s ruling.
“We’re obviously very disappointed with the ruling. There are dozens of lies, mistruths, it’s really poorly written and it makes a very incoherent legal argument. By the end of the day we’ll be making an appeal to the ASUO Constitution Court,” Bowman said. “We’re confident that con court is going to overrule the decision and I’ll be back on the ballot. It’s disappointing that the board made their decision on lies but that’s why there’s a checks and balances in the system.”
Bowman and Wu’s disqualification from the race takes place immediately. Mighty Oregon will be allowed to replace their presidential candidate with one of the current registered vice presidential candidates, which is ASUO Senator Taylor Allison and Austin Palacios.
Tullis cited in his grievance that he was intimidated, harassed and bribed by Bowman and members on his executive ticket, including former Mighty Oregon Greek Coordinator Marshall Kosloff and current Mighty Oregon Greek Coordinator Alex Titus.
The Elections Board states that Bowman was in violations of eight sections of the ASUO election rules. According to the ruling, violation of rule 7.13.1 was one of the biggest from Bowman.
“(Rule 7.13.1) was violated when Bowman and/or Kosloff told Tullis that (1) he would be “blacklisted” from the ASUO, (2) he would be “blacklisted” from Greek life, (3) either Bowman or former associates of Bowman would write negative articles in the Daily Emerald about Tullis, (4) his fraternity would not be able to charter if he continued to run, and (5) when Cheever told Tullis’s girlfriend that she would not be able to rush Gamma Phi Beta because of Tullis’s campaign. Separately, each is a serious form of intimidation.”
According to the ruling, Wu approached Grayson McCormick at his work and confronted him by saying that Tullis is running a “smear” campaign against Bowman. McCormick is the president of Delta Upsion, which was the fraternity that Tullis was a part of until he believed that the fraternity would suffer consequences from him running for president.
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