LOGAN – Utah State University students have spoken out about the recent student body president election. Isaac Ngatuvai and Tavo Estrada claimed the Utah State University Student Association (USUSA) election was unfair, saying concurrent enrollment students participated.
“There was controversy that we felt was against the bylaws of the USUSA constitution,” Ngatuvai said.
USUSA posted the election results online.
The second round of voting between Max Alder and Kapp McCallister was decided by eight votes out of nearly 4,000.
Ngatuvai said 113 of those votes came from concurrent enrollment students at a local high school.
Ngatuvai and Estrada created a petition to demand a recount of the votes, excluding the 113.
“We realized that there’s nothing actionable that was going to happen unless students spoke out about it,” Ngatuvai said. “We wanted our student representatives to be selected in a process that was reflected in the values of fairness, integrity, and hard work.”
In an email to students, Kris Winter the vice president for student success, acknowledged student concerns.
“This year’s concerns have made clear that parts of that process need additional clarity and refinement, particularly around how voter eligibility is defined and applied,” Winter said. “Over the next few months, staff will partner with the USUSA student leaders to review this year’s concerns and make needed updates moving forward.”
Those updates could include clarifying USUSA constitution language, revising election bylaws, and Winter said even improving how they administer elections.
“In the meantime, the election results as reported will stand for the upcoming academic year, and student representatives were sworn in last week,” Winter said.