SPARC ticket remains eligible for IUSA election

After more than a week of uncertainty, the SPARC for IU ticket will remain on the IU Student Association ballot, the Student Body Supreme Court ruled early Thursday morning.

SPARC was initially disqualified March 20 after Thomas Dauer, the ticket’s candidate for vice president of congress, withdrew citing time constraints, according to emails obtained from the court.

“I recommend that you have Bronson (Bast) replace me; he seems very passionate about student government and his interests are more aligned with sustained commitment to the ticket,” Dauer wrote to presidential candidate Sidney Fletcher on March 19. “I don’t know if election rules will allow you to formally put him in my spot or if you’ll have to do that after the election.”

This email was forwarded to Election Commissioner Melody Mostow, who suggested Dauer should withdraw officially before the commission would react.

In response to his official withdrawal, the commission disqualified SPARC from the election, citing that the ticket did not have a full executive slate as required by the Election Code. As the filing deadline had passed, the commission said SPARC would not be able to replace Dauer.

The SPARC ticket claimed Mostow violated a portion of the code that requires the commission to issue advisory opinions interpreting the code. Mostow and the commission said there was no request for an advisory opinion.

“I was never asked for ‘an advisory opinion,’” Mostow said. “I’m not a law student, so my original interpretation of the code was based on common understanding of the words. It was not until I was accused of violating the code that I understood an advisory opinion had a technical legal definition.”

There is no formal training process for the commission and very little institutional memory even for those who serve for more than one year because a new commission runs each election, she said.

Although the court’s full opinion has not been released, the initial decision says the commission “failed to provide a sufficient advisory opinion.” It also says “SPARC must be allowed to replace members of its executive slate.”

Chief Justice Matthew Bower did not release the court’s vote but said SPARC had a distinctive majority.

“We were all obviously really happy,” Fletcher said. “My attitude personally is that the devil’s in the details, and it’s not clear at the moment what the court is going to say.”

The court mandated that the Election Commission determine how Dauer’s replacement will be chosen and certified.

Unless the full opinion suggests otherwise, Mostow said Dauer would likely need to be replaced by a congressional candidate who attended the All-Candidates Meeting. Because Dauer withdrew and never attended the meeting, he remains ineligible.

Currently, the IUSA Election Code is silent on the issue of candidates dropping out mid-campaign, leaving it to the discretion of the commission.

“We strictly interpreted the code,” Mostow said. “It had nothing to do with setting or not setting precedent. It was our honest attempt to understand.”

She said one concern was maintaining a fair election not just for SPARC but for the other two tickets on the ballot, YOUniversity and Hoosiers 4 Solutions.

“Had we tried to allow them to replace a candidate, I don’t think I would’ve felt right about that, and one of the other campaigns probably would’ve appealed it,” Mostow said.

For his part, YOUniversity presidential candidate Jose Mitjavila said he’s glad SPARC remains in the race.

“I wanted to see a better turnout candidate-wise this year,” he said. “I greatly appreciate the competition, and I’m glad they get to stay in the race.”

Mitjavila is a member of the current administration, which ran unopposed. He also echoed concerns raised by the Election Commission about the need for candidates to be committed through the whole campaign process.

“I feel the Supreme Court made the right decision, but I think it should’ve been emphasized that in the future we should be looking out for the commitment of the candidates,” he said. “You don’t want candidates that are just going to back out of the race halfway through.”

Hoosiers 4 Solutions presidential candidate Casey Shelburne said he understood the commission’s initial decision that the filing deadline was final and believed they made the right call initially.

“The Election Commission’s done a good job, and I understood where they were coming from,” Shelburne said. “Now I’ll just be interested to see where the Supreme Court was coming from.”

He also said Hoosiers 4 Solutions is looking forward to a competitive election regardless of whether ticket members agreed with the court’s decision.

For the time being, Fletcher and the SPARC ticket are waiting for details from the Election Commission about how to proceed. The commission will set the rules about who is eligible to fill Dauer’s vacated position.

“We haven’t heard anything, and my guess is they’re doing the same thing we are, which is waiting for details from the court,” Fletcher said. “We’re dependent on the details and how the election commission reacts to that. We’re just waiting and listening at this point.”