Committee reduces sanctions

In a Student Government judicial hearing yesterday, members of the judicial committee voted to… In a Student Government judicial hearing yesterday, members of the judicial committee voted to reduce the election committee’s sanctions against presidential candidate Zach Ransom and his Proven slate mates.

The six-person committee voted unanimously to uphold the ban on campaigning yesterday, but overturned the elections committee’s decision to withhold candidates’ $100 deposits and ban them from the event where the election results were announced.

The elections committee ruled Tuesday night that Ransom, slate mates Jen Anukem and Joe Leinbach, campaign managers Lauren Harris and Jim Wright, and Ransom’s brother, Austin, were guilty of violating the elections code rules against solicitation.

Judicial Chair Leslie Luzhansky explained that the judicial committee thought the election committee’s decision was “too extreme and somewhat unreasonable.”

They upheld the sanction against campaigning yesterday because it “matched the crime.” Since the candidates broke a rule limiting their campaigning, their punishment would be a restriction on campaigning.

“You took extra. Well, now you’re going to lose [a chance to campaign],” Luzhansky said.

A statement from elections chair Greg Heller-LaBelle defined campaigning as wearing promotional T-shirts, handing out flyers or hanging posters on campus, shaking hands, introducing oneself as a candidate and “any active promotion of any candidate in the election.”