This article was updated on March 11 to include that candidates Fields and Calixte succeeded in the appeal process of their potential Election Code violations.
Not two weeks into election season, three candidates were initially accused of being in violation of the Student Government Association’s Election Code.
Presidential candidate Shay’na Fields, Executive Vice President candidate Jessie Calixte were brought before the Student Judicial Board in reference to Article 3, section 4 C and D for forming an “illegal party.”
According to an official statement from the SGA Election Commission, on March 5 Fields campaigned in Library Plaza with materials representing all three candidates. Presidential candidates aren’t allowed to “campaign as part of a party, and EVP candidates may not campaign as part of a party with Senator candidates,” according to that statement.
Vote Everywhere GSU, a student organization, publicly endorsed the two candidates including senatoratorial candidate Nigel Walton, when they made a social media post showing the tabling event. Fields was the only one to disclose this official endorsement, meaning that both Calixte and Walton both had to submit an Endorsement Form.
Fields shared an Instagram post earlier today of her campaign table in Library Plaza. It was likely this post, which displayed Walton and Calixte’s flyers sitting on her table, that tipped the Election Commission off.
Calixte and Fields have both successfully appealed the sanctions and were found not to be in violation of the Election Code.
A week prior, Sen. Hamza Rahman filed a complaint against Calixte for pre-campaigning because he sent an email to the Muslim Student Association declaring his candidacy before campaigning was allowed. Calixte had to suspend campaigning for 48 hours from Feb. 24-26.
On Feb. 22, Mariah Johnson, Jordan Parker, Janii McIver and William Landers and Shinjini Srivastava were disqualified from the election per Article 3, section 1 H for failing to attend a mandatory candidate orientation.
Jordan Parker, Janii McIver and William Landers were disqualified from the race for not completing the mandatory iCollege forms for Perimeter students.
