Conte, Zuniga narrowly win ASG election

Katherine+Conte+and+Juan+Zuniga.+The+ticket+won+51.25+percent+of+the+vote.%0A

Courtesy of Katherine Conte

Katherine Conte and Juan Zuniga. The ticket won 51.25 percent of the vote.

James Pollard, Campus Editor

SESP junior Katherine Conte and Weinberg junior Juan Zuniga narrowly won the election for Associated Student Government president and executive vice president Saturday, election commissioner Joe Maino confirmed.

Conte and Zuniga won 51.25 percent of the vote, Maino told The Daily. They defeated SESP junior Soteria Reid and her running mate, Weinberg sophomore Revika Singh, who Maino said garnered 46.26 percent of the vote.

“We have a lot of work ahead of us,” Conte said. “We learned a lot during this election, and we’re thankful to the other ticket for running a good campaign and we’re excited to get to work!”

It was the closest ASG election since 2016, when Christina Cilento and Macs Vinson won by 81 votes.

In total, 2,064 students cast a ballot in this year’s election — a significant jump from the 852 students who voted in 2019’s uncontested ASG election, which featured the lowest voter turnout in at least 10 years.

“We just really want to let everyone know that we are thankful for the support of the Northwestern community,” Zuniga said.

Still, the number fell short of the voter turnout numbers posted in the last contested election in 2018, when 2,272 students voted.

From this year’s voters, 2.47 percent, or 51 students, voted “no confidence.”

Both campaigns took to social media Saturday night to share the results. Reid and Singh thanked their supporters for showing up, noting the tireless work their team did to provide leadership the most vulnerable students could trust would work for them.

“For us or against us, even during a pandemic, students mobilized to pick leaders to represent them in numbers that ASG hasn’t seen in years,” the post said. “And we are proud to have been part of this monumental moment.”

Yunkyo Kim contributed reporting.

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Twitter: @pamesjollard