Hayward Campaign on Time-out

Another UC campaign, another violation.

This time around, the George J.J. Hayward '11 and Felix Zhang '11 campaign for Undergraduate Council President and Vice President got a slap on the wrist from the UC's Election Commission in the form of a six hour campaign suspension from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. today.

Why, you ask?

Apparently, the campaign stands accused of asking students not on their staff to forward campaign materials. The horror!

Hit the jump for the full text of the reprimand, featuring not one, not two, but four rule citations!

Dear UC and Liaisons,

This constitutes official notice as required by rule 1.7.

Starting at 3:44PM Monday and continuing through at least 2:39AM Tuesday, a Hayward/Zhang staff member repeatedly e-mailed several individuals who were not at the time staff of the Hayward/Zhang campaign. Most of them are still not staff of the campaign. These e-mails instructed these students to forward official campaign material to their dorm, house, or student group e-mail lists. In addition, Brian Ru, Alex Parkinson, and Felix Zhang were all recipients of these e-mails, and are therefore presumed to be aware that they were sent. In at least one instance, one of the individuals e-mailed sent such a campaign e-mail while not on the campaign staff. Several other individuals complained to the EC that they were receiving these e-mails despite having never requested them.

Per rule 2.5, only staff members may engage in campaign activities. Rule 2.7 further specifies that campaign staff may not coordinate the activities of supporters who are not on their staff. Rule 4.1 explicitly includes "distributing campaign material ... electronically" in the definition of campaign activity.

Furthermore, on Monday at 6PM, the EC met with both Brian and Alex, and informed them that an e-mail sent by a different campaign staffer that was similar in form the the e-mails in question was in violation of the rules. At that time, the EC instructed Alex, the campaign liaison, to ensure that all Hayward/Zhang staff were reminded of this rule.

It is therefore the unanimous determination of the EC that the e-mails sent by Hayward/Zhang staffer constitute a violation of rules 2.5 and 2.7, and additionally demonstrate a failure to instruct staff to observe these rules as required by the EC. This is despite the campaign having already been penalized for this same offense yesterday.

As a result, under rule 6.5, it is the unanimous decision of the EC that the Hayward/Zhang Campaign shall be suspended for a period of six hours, beginning at 10AM on Wednesday and ending at 4PM the same day.

During this suspension, all staff on the campaign are prohibited from engaging in campaign activities, including distributing and displaying campaign materials, and e-mailing students on behalf of the campaign. A suspension does NOT require that any campaign materials already

distributed be recalled or taken down. Campaigning during a suspension may result in further penalties, up to and including disqualification.

It shall be the responsibility of the campaign to inform their staffers of this decision and to ensure that the suspension is observed.

Please contact the election commission at this address if you have any questions.

Sincerely,

Brad Seiler

Election Commission Chair