Campaign accusations rule!

Chris points us to some campaign violation accusations against Ilana Nankin. I took a look at the e-mails, and can summarize the two as follows:

Thingie 1
This is an e-mail to a small percentage of Ilana's close personal friends (around half a thousand of them). It's usual "vote for me and my party, and tell your friends" stuff. The signature includes:

Ilana Nankin
Senator, Associated Students of the University of California (ASUC)
University of California, Berkeley

I guess the claim is that this constitutes using ASUC authority to campaign. I can sort of see it, but that may be pushing it. It's a signature, and she's identified by it. The canonical form of this violation is using the ASUC logo.

Thingie 2
This thingie accuses Student Action of leaving their base unattended, but there aren't any pictures. There are pictures of a sign reading "Ilana's Meeting! 118 Barrows," apparently for her campaign kickoff, stuck on a wall. This one I did know about before. If it's "campaign material," it's a violation. Is it campaign material? Iunno. Probably not, if the Judicial Council uses the definition in the campaign finance section:

Campaign material is defined as material initiated by a party or candidate, with the intent to contact voters publicly, that explicitly speaks, pleads, or argues in favor of the election or defeat of a candidate or party.

This is a good time for an interlude, though. Why can campaigns use university rooms for these meetings? The week before spring break, some discussion of this was in the Senate. From the minutes, when Travis Garcia showed up to complain about something-or-other:

Ms. Avelino asked if he was aware that any registered organization in OSL could rent a room. Mr. T. Garcia asked if Student Action was organized like that. Ms. Avelino said that if someone from Student Action was a registered signatory, they could rent a room for a meeting. Mr. T. Garcia said that if they're a signatory of a club, he asked if they were supposed to reserve campaign rooms under the pretense of holding a meeting for that club, and if such meetings should be open. Ms. Avelino said they were.

No one ever really answered the question he was raising: Do student groups reserve rooms for ASUC political parties? Because that, I think, is a serious issue, especially if the student groups are ASUC-sponsored.

posted by Beetle Aurora Drake 4/12/2007 05:05:00 PM #
Comments (6)

. . .

Comments:

i dont think they reserve rooms. they go to the building and find an empty room.

# posted by  Anonymous : 5:58 PM, April 12, 2007

 

That would seem like a really dumb thing to do. I know that I'd never even think about using my OSL registration on something like that. It'd be a really obvious violation and like anonymous said, there are tons of empty rooms available and other things that are much less shady.

# posted by  Anonymous : 6:13 PM, April 12, 2007

 

A few years ago a Student Advocate candidate was disqualified for coopting ASUC resources by using a font made popular by the Student Advocate Office. The logic? ASUC money went into popularizing and branding the font. People associated the font with the office and therefore were given an impression of implicit endorsement from the SAO. Bryant may have had other sanctions against him already but this was the charge that booted him from office. If J-Council believes in precedent, Ilana will receive a censure as well.

# posted by  Anonymous : 1:15 AM, April 13, 2007

 

The Judicial Council does not believe in precedent, and I don't see how this particular example would matter if it did. If you're saying "That was tenuous, this is tenuous, so..." then maybe, but that isn't much of a legal argument. The logic that leads to "popularized font is a resource" does not stop at "identification as Senator is a resource" along the way.

# posted by  Beetle Aurora Drake : 1:23 AM, April 13, 2007

 

When I worked in the OSL (note: not for it, in it), Student Action itself was a registered student group with the Office of Student Life...mm, secret student group constitutions...

and I think the title-in-your-signature thing has come up before...Misha maybe? Bobby or Mike I expect would know.

# posted by  Anonymous : 8:52 AM, April 13, 2007

 

I never said "this is tenuous, this is tenuous, but..." There was controversy surrounding the case but with a couple years of hindsight, it makes sense. The point is that the by-laws do not only restrict spending ASUC money on one's campaign - they restrict coopting things that ASUC money has been spent on promoting. A font and a title are analogous when viewed in that light.

# posted by  Anonymous : 12:00 PM, April 13, 2007

 

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