In their third meeting of the winter quarter, the undergraduate student government debated a new bill requiring at least one individual running on a vice presidential and presidential ticket to have 20 weeks of prior experience.
The bill was authored by President Pro Tempore Colton Arciniaga and Scarlett Remer in response to the concern of having potential USG presidents and vice presidents unprepared to lead the organization. While proponents of the bill argued that an institutional understanding was essential to lead USG, opponents argued that this would create an unnecessary barrier in an election that should ultimately be decided by students.
Senators Josie Wilmes and Luke Miller were the first to voice their doubts. Speaker of the Executive Wilmes said that the bill might restrict potential candidates and anger the student body.
Responding to the objections, Senator Scarlett Remer said that USG is a student organization, and “you wouldn’t expect any other club to have a president or vice president that has absolutely no prior experience.”
Senator Colton Arciniaga, who participated in last year’s elections, said “Last year, I had to sit through being slandered on a school-wide stage because we had two sets of candidates who didn’t understand that in USG, we don’t slander each other.”
He said that each USG president has a relationship with the Chancellor comprised of intricacies that must be understood.
Senator Catalina Palacios discussed their feeling that DU has a complicated and slow bureaucratic process, which could be better navigated by someone who understands the intricacies of USG. They remarked that otherwise, “we would be setting them up for failure and to get laughed at by the board.”
Many other senators, including Senator Tyler Miller, Senator Sophie Docktor and Senator Addy Braun, then voiced their agreement with the bill. Specifically, Senator Bruan mentioned that “it’s not our job as senators to train the president; it’s our job to do senate work.”
At this point, President Hyde expressed their concern by saying, “We should have faith in our voters that they will vote for the correct people.” Hyde referenced their narrow win in the elections last year, where they beat out three other tickets, two of which had never had experience on USG prior.
Senator Naomy Napolitan said that the bill could potentially gatekeep, despite its best intentions. They stated that USG needs to work on its diversity, making it more publicized in elections.
Senator Arciniaga agreed, saying that the makeup of the senate has been historically white, but said that the issue should “unfortunately, be a different conversation that we will have to have.”
Responding, Senator Napolitan said “I’d love to vote for this bill,” then “I know the intention behind it, but it’s too limiting.” She brought up the point that if someone who could potentially make the Senate more diverse wanted to run but couldn’t because they didn’t have the experience, then “that would be limiting.”
The floor then moved to vote, and V.P. Headly announced it had passed with 15 yay’s and two nay’s. Moving forward, at least one candidate per presidential/vice presidential ticket in USG elections must have at least 20 weeks of USG experience.
The next order of business was to discuss a proposed bill to create a temporary committee focused on getting student representation on the Board of Trustees.
Senator Micah DenBraber said to the floor that he believes “this is the next step in USG’s relationship-building with the administration; this is a space we haven’t been before.”
The meeting ended with a presentation of USG’s executive branch reports by Senator Josie Wilmes. Some highlights include the possibility of free headshots around campus and a new food bank underneath the bookstore where students can go for leftover food items from the dining hall.
