Thousands of students were left angry and frustrated after waiting up to five hours in line to vote in the Undergraduate Student Government Downtown’s uncontested election Tuesday.
The line to vote wrapped around the block in an election with only one ticket running.
In an act students are calling voter suppression, USGD officials chose to change the election process from online voting on MyASU to in-person voting at one location at the Mercado Building. Thousands of students had to walk nearly seven minutes to the location.
“They don’t want us to vote,” said sophomore Ann Otherone. “They don’t want us to have that major key to democracy.”
After waiting several hours in line, some students opted to order pizza, but were told Dominos’ machine could not process their Maroon and Gold dollars. The polling location also ran out of ballots at one point.
Students complained that the long lines and inefficiency of the polling place robbed them of their right to vote.
“We have a voice and a right to elect who we want to represent us,” said junior Meg Lanton. “I want to be able to vote for the person who basically does nothing as USGD president.”
Furthering some students’ theory that the election was fixed, former USGD president and graduating senior Frank “FS3” Smith III was elected as president. Smith said he is considering extending his undergraduate education to serve as president.
“It’s ridiculous,” said freshman Damien Lee. “He doesn’t even go here.”
Smith was projected to win the election by Phoenix Diablo and other major media outlets while students were still in line to vote. Students are calling upon Maricopa County Recorder Helen Purcell to resign over the long wait times and potential voter disenfranchisement.
“Helen Purcell is inept,” said downtown Phoenix resident Peter Perspiration, who is not an ASU student and therefore ineligible to vote. “She should resign.”
Students have started a change.org petition to call for a revote.
District 7 Michael Nowakowski resigned his position on the Phoenix City Council on Thursday to accept a post as a fry cook at the recently opened Chick-fil-A location on ASU’s downtown campus.
Nowakowski, who, in an unrelated statement, emphatically reiterated his longstanding support for the LGBT community, said he was excited to begin a new chapter in his career with a company that shares his values. He said he had been considering a job switch for a few months, but needed to wait for the right opportunity.
“Everything I’ve been working toward has led to this moment,” Nowakowski said, with tears of joy streaming down his cheeks. “It’ll be an honor to be the person who makes the waffle fries, instead of just the guy voraciously consuming them.”
Nowakowski said his vote to approve the Chick-fil-A’s permits was not influenced by his spot on the board of the Phoenix Chicken Sandwich association, a nonprofit organization that advocates for succulent bird-based meals and the group partnering with ASU to bring the eatery downtown.
District 6 Councilman Sal DiCiccio applauded Nowakowski’s move, remarking that the city had lost sight of its traditional values of eating mouthwatering nuggets six days a week.
“I’m excited to have a business downtown that understands the importance of traditional chicken,” DiCiccio said. “It warms my heart to know that Michael sees that value as well. In downtown, traditional chicken has been under assault for too long. Eating chicken with doughnuts or waffles… is simply unnatural.”
Nowakowski said his new employer is proud to be part of the downtown Phoenix community, and that all customers are welcome, as long as they pray for at least five minutes before eating and loudly proclaim their assigned sex before entering the correct restroom.
“It’s so great to see so much enthusiasm for this Chick-fil-A,” Nowakowski said. “For a while, I thought this chain was my little secret. I discovered it in 2011 and, for years, it seemed like I was the only one who ever ate there.”
Fictional character Cosmo Kramer, pictured at right, narrowly defeated actor Will Smith 1137 votes to 1336 votes in a surprisingly entertaining and supposedly important USGD presidential election. (Glove Urn Mint/PD)
Fictional character Cosmo Kramer narrowly defeated actor Will Smith in a surprisingly entertaining and supposedly important Undergraduate Student Government Downtown presidential election.
Kramer won the election with 1337 votes to Smith’s 1336 in an election that came down to the wire and saw candidates promising everything from alien invasion insurance to new episodes of Seinfeld.
With the win, Kramer became the first fictional character elected to a position traditionally filled by real people.
“To rule the people, one must walk among them,” Kramer said in an acceptance speech that emphasized his fictional roots. Kramer had been considered out of the running for USGD president after Seinfeld ended in 1998, but rallied over the past three weeks to take the win.
Kramer’s campaign promised hourly jokes delivered via MyASU and new episodes of Seinfeld to be streamed every week in place of student government meetings.
Neither candidate knew that he was nominated for the position until notified by student government election staff after spring break, but sprang into action despite the unexpected nature of the campaign.
Former USGD President Frank Smith III said that he felt the elections committee made a mistake, but that an oddly worded elections code prevented him from challenging the ruling.
Walter Cronkite School student Videog Proj said that she voted for Kramer because she liked Seinfeld and wanted to see more.
“I just wanted more Seinfeld,” she said. “My friend, Threeo Onekid, said he didn’t vote because he didn’t want to take a stance on 1990s comedies that could reflect on his work in the future.”
Will Smith said that by electing a fictional character, ASU’s Downtown Phoenix campus had doomed itself to destruction by aliens that would harvest resources and organs from the city.
“Humanity is going to be destroyed,” Smith said. “Only the president can authorize a suicide mission to hack into the alien command ship, and this president seems more concerned with jokes than survival.”
Kramer denied that the aliens were planning to destroy the planet and said they would only be involved with human organ harvesting and approving student organization funds.
“I’ve spoken with our new senators, and they are more than willing to work with alien faculty and staff on both the Budget Allocations and newly formed Mothership Operations committees,” Kramer said.
Smith ran on a platform that included lowering tuition by flying a plane into the offices of the Board of Regents and hacking their computers, opportunities to test for internships at local financial institutions and free companion dogs to help students prepare for the apocalypse.
Smith campaign manager M. Night Shyamalan said that the loss was planned from the beginning. Shyamalan’s campaigns have received fewer and fewer votes every year.
Smith’s running mate and son, Jaden Smith, said that there were still questions to be asked about how a Kramer presidency will function.
“How can our votes be real if the candidate isn’t real?” he asked.
After the vote totals were announced, Russian President Vladmir Putin called Kramer to congratulate him on the win. Putin expressed hopes that under new leadership, the campus would be more open to the possibility of invasion or coup. Kramer declined to say whether he would participate with Putin in the traditional, post-election, shirtless horseback-riding ceremony.
Other candidates that accrued votes included deceased economist Adam Smith, Dutch speed skater Yep Kramer and two-term USGD President and former ASU student Joseph Grossman.
Grossman said that even though he lost, he will return next year on a platform based on his connections in the Arizona Alien Affairs lobby.
Even with this election’s astronomical stakes, the broader downtown Phoenix community really didn’t care.
“It really doesn’t matter,” downtown advocate Peter Perspiration said. “It doesn’t matter who was elected. Nothing will change unless students get involved with the community.”
