Transcript reveals that Debbie & Blake filed complaint


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After delaying the publication of a transcript from a hearing regarding allegations against the Mai & Brianna campaign, the Undergraduate Student Government released a transcript Thursday revealing that the Debbie & Blake ticket had filed the complaint.

In the complaint, the Debbie & Blake campaign said that the Mai & Brianna campaign had violated Elections Code VII.A and VIII.A, alleging that the opposing campaign received help designing a graphic from somebody outside of their core five team before official campaigning began on Jan. 25.

The Election Commission, which facilitated the hearing on Monday, released a verdict on Wednesday, finding that “no infraction occurred” within the Mai & Brianna campaign.

The transcript reveals that in the hearing, the Debbie & Blake campaign presented a social media caption from the student who allegedly designed Mai & Brianna’s graphics. The caption stated that the designer had the “opportunity to design all the graphics for the MB 2018 team campaign.”

The Mai & Brianna campaign responded to these allegations by stating that the designer had no knowledge that the graphics were for the official campaign, but rather that they were for a school project.

The Mai & Brianna campaign presented a letter from the designer as evidence.

“Prior to January 25 at 7 PM, I had NO KNOWLEDGE that Mai and Brianna were running for office through USG,” the email read. “I’m deeply sorry for any trouble that I have caused and hope this matter will be resolved as soon as possible.”

In a verdict published Wednesday, the Election Commission stated, “The petitioners could not prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the respondent’s had violated Elections Code.”

Following the publication of the verdict, the Daily Trojan requested an official transcript copy of Monday’s hearing at the USG office Wednesday afternoon, but was denied.

According to the Elections Code XIII.D, “a written copy of the transcript will be released to both the general public and the press.”

USG’s statement also said that the Elections Code required that the transcript be made available within “the 24-hour window,” but no such timeframe is listed in the Elections Code. Instead, the code states that “the transcript shall be available in the USG office for public consumption as soon as a verdict is reached.”

In a statement sent to the Daily Trojan on Thursday after the release of the transcripts, USG extended “its deepest apologies” for the delayed release of the hearing transcript.

“Due to unforeseen circumstances and technical difficulties, the hearing transcript was released the morning of Thursday,” the USG statement read. “The USG Elections and Recruitment team are ardently working on developing a more efficient method of releasing future hearing transcripts.”