‘Les’ Go! – Close races and blowouts highlight final elections
The students of Utah State University voted last week and loudly proclaimed that Les is more.
After the surprising decision from Associated Students of USU presidential candidate Josh Cook to drop out of the election Thursday, his opponent Les Essig went on to receive 2,997 votes – the most of any candidate in the election.
Brigham Rupp, who came in third to Essig and Cook in last week’s primary elections, filed as a write-in candidate, but received just 154 votes in the final election.
While Essig’s victory was by far the largest margin of all the races, multiple other candidates saw large victories. Public relations VP-elect Emily Bott received 2,537 votes to Justin Lafeen’s 1,047. In the race for athletics VP, Jimi Jorgenson defeated Chris Sadoski by more than 1,300 votes. Jorgenson rode high on the support of current Athletics VP Tyler Olsen, who was seen wearing T-shirts supporting Jorgenson.
“I’m sure that as soon as I am sworn in and the keys are handed over to me, this office will be full of surprises,” Jorgenson said. “I am looking forward to every minute that I have to serve as athletics vice president.”
Friday’s announcements in the Taggart Student Center Sunburst Lounge capped off a week of campaigning. The week-long process was shortened from previous years, something Essig said worked out well.
“Initially, I thought that the one-week campaign would make fewer students vote,” he said. “I liked the one week of campaigning because it gives you the opportunity to not fall so far behind in class.”
Essig’s concern of fewer students voting did not come to pass, Public Relations VP Ashley Stolworthy said. This year, 4,735 students voted, compared to about 4,500 last year. Stolworthy said she was concerned about the voter turnout after seeing the small attendance at the debates and candidate forums that were set up last week.
Stolworthy said there were some changes to this year’s process, other than the shorter schedule, that had a positive impact on the turnout. More advertising such as radio ads was purchased and candidate biographies were linked directly from the ballot Web site, Stolworthy said.
A crowd of about 300 students – mostly supporters for candidates – gathered to hear the results Friday afternoon.
“I was so nervous that I couldn’t sit in my chair,” Bott said. “I was really close to being last and I couldn’t sit through one more person’s results without being nervous.”
Some candidates were justified in their nervousness based on the close results of four races. The agricultural senator, arts and lectures VP, academic VP and activities VP positions were all decided by 30 or fewer votes. The closest race was for activities VP, where Kathy Leslie defeated second-year candidate and current administrative assistant Nick Robbins by eight votes.
Essig said the process brought out feelings of excitement, energy, disappointment and some surprises.
“After hundreds and hundreds of hours of trying to distinguish yourself from the other candidates who you are both running against and all the other candidates who also are trying to draw attention to themselves, it comes down to that single announcement where all your hard work has been successful or not,” Essig said.
Following the results announcement, the new council met in the council chambers to meet each other and go over plans to train for their new positions. The council will leave Logan on Thursday for a two-day retreat at the Bear Lake Training Center in Garden City.
The start on training is earlier than past years, Executive VP-elect Tagg Archibald said, but should be a good change.
“We’re really going to get started earlier this year and get going on the issues,” he said. “I’m excited to get things going for next year.”
-str@cc.usu.edu