Candidates for Associated Student Government academic vice president face an extension to their campaigns, while McCormick sophomore Katie Bradford won the election for student life vice president with slightly more than a majority of the vote.
Gabby Daniels garnered 41.6 percent of the vote for academic vice president, while opponent Zach Wittchow picked up 37.3 percent. The ballot option “no confidence” clocked in at 19.5 percent of the vote. As neither candidate received a majority of the vote, a run-off election will be held Friday.
Bradford received 53.5 percent in the student life vice presidential race, while Weinberg freshman Jonathan Friedman got 27.5 percent. No confidence picked up 16.7 percent.
Bradford was in an ASG Senate meeting when Election Commission Chairman Jeff Cao delivered the results.
“I was ecstatic,” she said. “I just couldn’t help smiling. I was a lot more nervous going into it than I thought I was going to be, so it was great to be done with that part and getting ready to move forward.”
After meeting with the outgoing Student Life Committee, Bradford said her first step is to reach out to make the committee more diverse.
“I really want to look into recruiting efforts, because our committee is primarily freshmen,” she said. “If we want to talk to off-campus issues and Greek issues, we really need people from other classes as well.”
Friedman, a Weinberg freshman, could not be reached for comment after the results were announced.
After hearing the result by phone from Cao at about 7:45 p.m., Daniels said, “Honestly, I don’t really know how I feel.” A couple hours earlier, she had said that the non-presidential candidates usually seem to get lost in the campaign shuffle.
“Maybe this is a good thing,” the Weinberg sophomore said. “Maybe people will actually care about this position.”
Daniels said she has strep throat and has not slept much. She spent much of the day handing out flyers and said she “hasn’t let up at all” in her campaigning.
“I don’t think I was really able to explain how much I know about ASG and how much I’ve done on the (Academic Committee),” she said. “I guess it gives me another two days. I’m just gonna do my best.”
Wittchow was also sitting in ASG Senate when he received a phone call informing him of the result.
“I thought it was going to be close,” the Weinberg junior said. “I didn’t think there were going to be as many no confidence votes.”
He had spent the evening at his fraternity house, Sigma Chi, watching “The Mist” and eating dinner before heading to the library to catch up on reading for two classes-“History of the Vietnam War” and “History of the Holocaust.” Though he wasn’t required to attend Senate, he said he thought it would be a good idea to go.
As dialogue continued in Senate, Wittchow quietly left his seat to answer his phone. Though he looked unnerved, he shrugged his shoulders and headed back to Senate.”I’m up to it,” Wittchow said. “I have extra fliers.”
