ASUSU faces decision on election bribery
The ASUSU Executive Council debated about the use of bribery in student government elections during a Nov. 27 meeting.
The discussion was a follow-up to a discussion the week prior on election bylaws.
Christian Orr, ASUSU student advocate vice president, said it is acceptable for candidates to pass out coupons and small items of encouragement because they count as sponsorship.
“I don’t think that coupons sway peoples’ votes, and if it encourages them to actually get out there and vote, then great,” Orr said. “If a burrito or free chips and a drink is the only thing that’s going to get our students to be incentivized to vote, then maybe that’s what we need.”
Jordan Hunt, the academic senate president, said by allowing candidates to hand out incentives to students, the government is allowing them to harass the students for votes. He said it may be less confrontational to bribe students, but it is still wrong.
“So it makes it okay to harass students,” Hunt said. “It doesn’t mean it’s as abrasive because instead of just shoving paper in their face, occasionally that paper might be something that they want.”
Orr said students would feel less imposed upon if they were offered something in return for their vote. He said students are more annoyed when the candidates force their campaign on them and if there were an incentive, students would gladly participate.
Karsen Kalian, the ASUSU athletics vice president, said bribes would help student involvement because the students won’t otherwise participate based on what they liked about the candidates.
“If we are using the free food, the coupons as a means to get students involved, is that really building student involvement?” Kalian said. “If you get rid of those coupons you force the candidates to find ways to engage the students within their campaign.”
Hunt said bribery on campus is nearly unavoidable and ASUSU needs to decide what is acceptable by school standards.
“As far as whether or not coupons are bribery, they are,” Hunt said. “Whether or not we should allow that form of bribery I think is a little bit insane.”
Hunt said the decision can’t be made overnight but requires deep thought before taking any action. James Morales, vice president of Student Services, said there shouldn’t be any question to it.
“Raffles or any enticement with the opportunity to win an item in exchange for a vote is illegal and contrary to the student elections bylaws,” Morales said.
He said bribery is against what USU stands for and also against state law. He said groups of people had in the past held raffles and contests in order to gather votes against government-made referendums. He said student involvement may drop if candidates can no longer rely on incentives, but the change would be welcome.
“I would always encourage students to look for alternative ways to increase interest in elections,” Morales said. “We should be a little more innovative about acceptable means of drawing student turnout.”
– addison.m.t.hall@gmail.com