Six candidates have been confirmed to the official UGBC presidential ballot. A primary election will be held on Mar. 22 to narrow down the competition to three remaining teams before the general election. The deadline to enter the race was Mar. 1.
The final teams in contention for the positions of president and executive vice president are Anthony Perasso, LSOE ’17, and Rachel Loos, MCAS ’18, Russell Simons, MCAS ’17, and Meredith McCaffrey, MCAS ’17, Matthew Ulrich, MCAS ’17, and John Miotti, MCAS ’17, Nikita Patel, CSOM ’17, and Joseph Arquillo, LSOE ’17, Andrew Meck, MCAS ’18, and Jonathan Barbosa, LSOE ’18, and Ryan Fairhurst, MCAS ’17, and Charlie Butrico, MCAS ’18.
The general election will be held beginning on Mar. 31, and voting will close on April 1 at 8 p.m.
The deadline was extended from Jan. 29 to Mar. 1, after two of the three original campaigns—Olivia Hussey’s, MCAS ’17, campaign and Elizabeth Foley’s, MCAS ’17, team—dropped out due to personal matters. Perasso and Loos were the only team remaining.
“Rachel and I feel various feelings about new candidates joining the race,” Perasso said in an email. “We are happy to have new friends joining the race, because we got a little lonely when it was just us two with no competition. The second feeling is surprise, because, as the only two original candidates remaining, we have become The Establishment Candidates. The third and final feeling is funky—do you feel it, too?”
In order to ensure fair competition in the election, Perasso and Loos encouraged the Elections Committee to extend the nomination deadline to allow other teams to be added to the ballot.
McCaffrey originally planned to run on the ticket as the executive vice president to Hussey, but when personal family matters came up and Hussey had to exit the race, McCaffrey asked Simons to run as her partner. Simons thought about running for UGBC president prior to the original Jan. 29 deadline, but ultimately decided against it due to his busy schedule, he said. When presented with the opportunity to run with McCaffrey, however, he changed his mind, Simons said.
“Student government is something that I have been doing for basically my entire BC experience and so it has always been something that I have thought about,” Simons said.
Arquillo was the former campaign manager for Foley’s team, and when Foley dropped out of the race, her campaign endorsed the nomination of Arquillo and Patel.
“We have made running for UGBC our top priority over the past few months and have worked tirelessly to get the perspective of both students and administrators to find out how to best serve BC,” Patel said in an email. “As campus leaders in other organizations, such as the BC Marching Band and WeRunBC, we know that it takes listening to others to be an effective leader [sic] and plan on making this a cornerstone of our team.”
Each team received 250 student signatures endorsing its campaign, and attended mandatory meetings in order to be added to the ballot. Candidates must also be in good academic standing and have no conduct issues on their records.
Featured Image by Amelie Trieu / Heights Editor
