AUS Presidency Controversy

Ryan Trasolini has filed a complaint over his loss to Brian Platt by one vote, that of the Elections Administrator Matthew Naylor.

In an open letter written by Trasolini he claims that the votes for the position of AUS President were miscounted, and that a discrepancy exists between the reported tally of the Elections Committee and that of the totals approved by scrutineers Ignacio Rodriguez and Nathan Tippe. Scrutineers oversee the counting of the ballots as candidate's representatives to ensure that the handling of ballots is done in a fair and impartial manner, and is reflective of the correct total. Ignacio Rodriguez was the scrutineer for Mike Silley, who was 16 shy of the total of the two tied candidates. Nathan Tippe was the scrutineer for Trasolini. Brian Platt did not have a scrutineer present at the time of ballot counting.

Both Rodriguez and Tippe had signed a document prior to the official announcement of the results stating that they agree with the totals given. Prior to his announcement that he will have to cast the tie breaking vote, Matthew Naylor presented the audience of a dozen or so people in the Gallery with the signed statement from the two scrutineers that the totals were fully representative of the votes cast, though it is important to state that scrutineers oversaw the paper ballot counting, and electronic votes were sent to the Elections Committee after approval from Chris Eaton, Academic Governance Officer. The document was written by Ignacio Rodriguez and was meant to certify that the scrutineers believed the vote counting was done properly.

Trasolini claims he should have won with a total of 204 votes to Platt's 202, stating that the two scrutineers both believe that Trasolini was 10 votes ahead of Platt in paper ballot counting, giving him a victory of 2 votes once the 8 vote lead by Platt in nline ballots is reduced. Upon being contacted for comment, Ignacio Rodriguez said "as a scrutineer I watched the counting of paper ballots, as I have said I believe that was handled properly and correctly. When adding up the total, the calculations were based on a Ryan Trasolini being 10 votes behind. Obviously if this was incorrect then the results would change. I have complete faith in the EA [Elections Administrator Matthew Naylor] to rectify any unintentional mistakes."