The days of giant signboards, candidate flyers and online
ballots are not over yet.
The 12 remaining candidates from last last week’s
Undergraduate Students Association Council general elections gear
up for one more week of campaigning before students vote in the
USAC runoff elections. Students can vote from 7 p.m. Tuesday to 7
p.m. Thursday on the MyUCLA Web site.
Six out of 13 offices will compete in the runoff elections this
week. Runoff elections are held for positions where more than two
candidates were competing and no candidate received more than 50
percent of the vote. Only the top two vote-getters remain on the
ballot.
For the general representative positions, one candidate needed
to receive 25 percent of the vote. Because none of the nine
candidates received the necessary votes, the top six candidates
will compete again this week.
The academic affairs, cultural affairs, and facilities
commissioners and the general representative positions will be up
for a vote this week.
The candidates, from both Students First! and Students United
for Reform and Equality, said they were confident they would be
successful.
Though going through the elections process is draining, SF!
candidate Sophia Kozak said she is still committed. Kozak is
running for the academics affairs commissioner position.
S.U.R.E. candidates also said they would be working hard to get
more votes this week.
“We have a lot at stake … there is going to be whole
sling of people out there working hard,” said Gerardo
Ornelas, a general representative candidate from S.U.R.E.
Candidates said the key to winning was educating students about
the elections.
Kozak said SF! would be trying to inform students that their
candidates were the most qualified and most experienced.
Informing students was S.U.R.E.’s priority too, Ornelas
said.
“We are going to concentrate on getting voters educated on
who we are and what we can do for them,” Ornelas said.
Candidates from the S.U.R.E. slate also believed they had an
increased chance of winning due to the elimination of the
candidates from the United Independents slate. U.I. candidates did
not garner enough votes last week to compete in the runoff
elections.
Some S.U.R.E. candidates believed U.I. may have taken some of
their votes.
“U.I. was a thorn in our side … (S.U.R.E.) is a lot
stronger now,” Ornelas said.
SF! candidates said they were still confident and would simply
focus on reaching more students.
With SF! sweeping the executive positions of president, internal
vice president and external vice president last week, S.U.R.E.
candidates said they would be approaching this week with a sense of
urgency.
“It is more important now than ever that people go out and
vote … S.U.R.E. representatives would check the executive
positions,” said Joshua Lawson, a general representative
candidate.
He added that the representatives from his slate would make sure
that SF! does not dominate council and reverse all of
S.U.R.E.’s accomplishments.
Candidates also said this week was vital for their slates to be
able to accomplish their goals.
To accomplish S.U.R.E.’s goal of increasing
council’s accessibility, Lawson said it is imperative that
his slate wins the remaining seats.
SF! general representative Linda Lam agreed that to ensure the
slate accomplishes all of its goals, they need to win all the
offices.
Candidate profiles can be found at dailybruin.ucla.edu.