At their Monday meeting, the Graduate Student Council (GSC) voted to suspend the joint bylaws and appoint two elections commissioners, Rebecca Harvey MBA ’26 and first-year masters student Gloria Ye. 

The vote required a two-thirds majority to allow both candidates to be seated despite there only being one vacancy for the position of elections commissioner. The Undergraduate Senate (UGS) must also vote to bypass the bylaws and appoint both candidates before they are officially elected. The UGS may also opt to elect one or neither of the candidates.

The move follows the resignation of previous commissioner, Christian Figueroa ’27, who stepped down due to allegations of election fraud, which led the GSC to solicit potential candidates. There is no upper limit on the number of seats that the elections commission can have.

“The elections commissioner’s job is to essentially run elections, which includes planning, sending out the proper notices, and communicating with the candidates as to what they are required to do or what they are not allowed to do,” said GSC co-chair Áron Ricardo Perez-Lopez, a third-year computer science Ph.D. student. 

In announcing her candidacy, Harvey highlighted her prior career in politics and community engagement, such as her work in Washington, D.C., where she ran campaigns at the local, state and federal level. 

“I want to redevelop trust and awareness in the student body,” Harvey said. “I would make sure elections are clean and trustworthy and that every voice is actually heard, as well as making sure that voters turn up since it’s important to get the student body engaged again.”

Ye emphasized the “alarming” low turnout rate from this year’s elections. Only 17.79% of the student body voted, with an undergraduate student turnout that was six times higher than the graduate student turnout. 

“If elected, my goal would be to raise the voting percentage and try and get as many voices heard as possible,” Ye said.

The GSC also reconsidered the election certification bill, following last week’s vote to not certify the Associated Students of Stanford University (ASSU) election results. Ultimately, the GSC voted to only certify the parts of the bill relating to funding. 

GSC co-chair Emmit Pert, a fourth-year chemistry Ph.D. student, introduced the motion to reconsider the decision to not certify the election results. Pert’s main concerns were that a special election would likely end up being held in summer, introducing many difficulties to the process.

“If you’re willing to plow through a ton of recommended bylaws, you could maybe get the election done by the end of the quarter,” Pert said. “A summer election seems like a huge nightmare, so I’m still of the opinion that the easiest way to solve this is to certify the election.”

Jas Espinosa ’18 M.A. ’19, ASSU financial manager, further outlined the consequences of not certifying the elections. 

“As of now, we don’t have the annual grants confirmed, meaning we will not collect revenue sufficient to disperse those annual grants,” Espinosa said.  

Espinosa echoed Pert’s sentiments regarding a summer election. 

“If we are talking about hosting a summer election, what about the disenfranchised students that are graduating this quarter that had the right to vote and would be ineligible to vote once they confer the degree,” Espinosa said. 

Chris West MBA ’25 asked Harvey and Ye how they would increase voter turnout if there were to be an election in the next couple of weeks or over the summer. Both indicated their intention to use their connections within the clubs and communities they are part of on campus. 

“I would think about the influencers at each school, student body and area of interest,” Harvey said. “So people who are club presidents or leading identity groups would be the people we need to reach out to.”

The GSC also voted to pass a motion to certify only the annual and joint grants from the election, which required a two-thirds majority vote. However, they did not vote to pass the portion of the election certification bill which would confirm the seating of GSC councilors, which also required a two-thirds majority. 

A joint resolution to reinstate co-ops Terra and Synergy was passed as well

Jules Gittin ’26, a current Synergy resident and future Synergy RA, explained that, due to low preassignment numbers, Residential Education (ResEd) initially presented Synergy and Terra with the options to “sunset” both co-ops, merge Synergy and Terra into one co-op or fill vacancies in the dorms with non co-op students. Despite the dorms agreeing to fill their vacancies with non co-op students, ResEd still informed them that they would lose their co-op status.  

The bill requested that the GSC pass a resolution to reinstate Synergy and Terra to co-op status effective immediately, open a second round of preassignment to the dorms, and to work with all co-ops to establish a strategy to maintain institutionalized longevity. 

“Co-ops are often the spaces where people for the first time in their lives feel safe,” Gittin told the GSC. “They are communities, homes and sanctuaries.”

Correction: A previous version of the article misstated that Residential & Dining Enterprises (R&DE) notified the co-ops of their low preassignment numbers. The Daily regrets this error.