The Undergraduate Student Government senate approved a bill to amend the elections code Tuesday night. 

Last week, senators heard a presentation from chief justice Julian Gajewski regarding changes to the elections code, but due to the required one-week grace period, the changes could not be voted on until this week’s meeting. 

Senate bill 146-04 includes various changes to the elections code, including an anonymous complaint form for election violations with the respondents’ identifying information only accessible to the judicial council. The individual who files the complaint will not be required to attend any potential hearing that results from the complaint.

Since last week’s meeting, Gajewski said language was added to the bill to develop a “police system” in the event that a justice were to leak the information of an individual who files an anonymous complaint. 

“The justice would have to recuse [themself] from the case in relation to the hearing that was taking place [with the] notice that was submitted,” Gajewski said. “Also, [the new language] provides the anonymous tipper with the opportunity to file a complaint against the justice [who] leaked their identity.”

As part of the election code changes, candidates will no longer be allowed to mass message students via USC’s email system, Slack or Brightspace. Candidates will now only be allowed to use USC’s email system to message Registered Student Organizations for an endorsement. 

Beyond amending the election code, senators also voted to table SB 146-06, a bill which would have approved the 2026-2027 USG office policy manual. 

Senator Zehran Muqtadir, who moved to table the bill, said he did so because chief of staff Shrinidhi Sriram was not in attendance at Tuesday’s meeting, which the senate felt was “necessary,” to present the bill and explain modifications to the manual.

“We don’t feel comfortable presenting and voting on this bill until [Sriram is] back in every capacity to be able to explain some of these potential modifications to us,” Muqtadir said. 

Muqtadir did not share what any of the potential modifications might be. Senators will revisit SB 146-06 during next week’s meeting. 

During reports of officers and directors, chief diversity officer Angie Del Gaudio highlighted some projects her department is focusing on, including revising the advocacy liaison recruitment cycle and expanding text-to-speech accommodations by using Speechify, an artificial intelligence tool that reads information aloud. 

“The text-to-speech accommodation that we have on campus is not helpful to students receiving [Office of Student Accessibility Services] services,” Gaudio said. “We would love to transition to Speechify.” 

In his report, chief communications officer Sammy Lee said his department has been analyzing social media and website analytics to identify how to best reach students. Lee also said the communications department is working on rolling out an “Ask USG” feature on its website, which is an AI chatbot to help RSOs navigate the website, as well as working on the newsletter. 

“We are excited to continue growing this newsletter this year,” Lee said. “It’s one of our favorite ways to connect with the student body, because we get to highlight so many things.”