Wednesday, March 28, 2018 // The Statement
4B
Wednesday, March 28, 2018 // The Statement
5B
The Machine: Inside the CSG race
by Tanya Madhani, Contributor
I
remember the outcome of each
Central
Student
Government
election during my time on the
University of Michigan cam-
pus clearly. My freshman year, the elec-
tion between Make Michigan’s Cooper
Charlton and Stephen Halperin, and
The Team’s Will Royster and Matt Fidel
ended in a victory for Make Michigan by a
four-vote margin. Junior year, I saw LSA
senior Anushka Sarkar and Public Policy
senior Nadine Jawad’s campaign and
achievements dismissed by the opposing
party’s candidates.
Seeing candidates of color lose and
their platforms dismissed in campus
elections is not a frequent event, but their
occurrences, however sparse and minute,
were frustrating to me nonetheless.
As part of my last semester on campus,
during yet another CSG election, I found
myself writing this article with the sim-
ple motivation to learn more about what
CSG campaigns are actually like, but
instead I found that frustrations I had
as a voter were just as apparent among
those who were in the assembly.
In the interviews I conducted through-
out the month, many raised concerns
about the tokenization of individuals and
the shadow of Greek life that loomed over
platforms from various parties.
“C
SG is treacherous,” Public
Policy junior Allie Brown,
senior policy adviser for
eMpower, said.
To Brown, the perception of CSG as an
organization that “does nothing,” is fair.
“For a lot of people, it’s more about
how it’ll look on their resume than what
they’re doing on campus,” she said.
During the fall semester of 2017, CSG
proposed a resolution to pay themselves
in a move that many panned as self-serv-
ing. Earlier this semester, CSG published
an affordability guide which students
criticized heavily as out of touch for rec-
ommending students cut back on laundry
and housekeeping services in order to
save money. Following the controversy,
CSG took the guide down, but many stu-
dents hadn’t forgotten about it by the
time the election for the 2018-2019 school
year came around.
Unlike Brown, several of the candi-
dates in the CSG race were previously a
part of the assembly and were part of the
incumbent president and vice presidents’
campaign during winter 2017.
When I spoke with candidates in
MomentUM, MVision, eMpower and
True Blue, each of them acknowledged
the criticism CSG receives for its sup-
posed ineffectiveness.
“I welcome the criticism when it comes
to CSG,” LSA junior Arathi Sabada, True
Blue’s presidential candidate, said, prior
to the election. “For me, it’s a lot less
about the position and the title, and more
about my impact. Being a good leader is
the ability to empathize with other stu-
dents.”
Sabada’s ties to CSG began in her fresh-
man year when she applied to the orga-
nization on a whim, eventually holding a
position as chief operating officer during
University alum David Schafer’s term in
the 2016-2017 school year.
“CSG can be a taxing organization,”
she said. “While there was change that
was happening when I was in it, I was not
satisfied.”
One of her initiatives was the annual
demographics report, Sabada said. She
spearheaded the report after being dis-
satisfied by the representation in the
organization.
“A
nushka and Nadine are the
first women of color to ever
hold the office together and
nothing can take that away from them,”
Public Policy junior Daniel Greene, now
president-elect from MVision, said about
the candidates that he formerly worked
for during their campaign.
When I met Greene at Espresso Royale’s
State Street location, he sat hunched over
his laptop typing away at another email
or text or Facebook message from some-
one in his campaign. After I brought up
how busy he must be, his eyes went wide,
and he nodded slowly.
“Let me show you my calendar,” he
said, twisting his laptop toward me. All
that was visible was a large purple square
on a bright, white background. “This is
my schedule for the week.”
When asked if he’s eaten, he gestured
towards a small plate in front of him,
which was clean, save two small pastry
crumbs.
When asked what his impression of CSG
this past year was, Greene hesitated and
offered an implicit rebuke of his predeces-
sors: “I’m sick and tired of large promises.”
“Campus is really hurting,” Greene
said, referencing racist flyers found dur-
ing the winter and fall 2017 semesters.
“What I want to do is follow up on those
promises. That’s why I’m running a cam-
paign that’s based on direct experience
and that’s why I’m willing to get less
sleep.”
There is virtually no difference in the
basic stances of each party’s platforms,
Greene said. What makes his party stand
out is first-hand, personal knowledge
of hot-button campaign issues and the
unique experiences they bring to each
aspect of their platform.
“No one on our campaign is here to
check off any boxes,” he said. “We’ve
picked the people that are the best for
the job.”
MVision was the only viable party with
an all-white executive ticket with both
being a part of Greek life. Their inclusion
of Black students in high-level positions
seemed to stand in contrast with their
ticket and Greek life roots. Some within
CSG, as well as voters, said this seemed
like a case of racial tokenization.
Public Policy junior Gabby McFarland
was part of MVision in its first few days,
but resigned two weeks before election
day for what she said were a variety of
different reasons, including some of the
party’s promotional material.
“There’s just a lot of dynamics with-
in the campaign that frustrated me,”
McFarland said.
This pressure would have been fine
had she only felt it from individuals out-
side campaign, McFarland said. Howev-
er, that was not the case, as she did not
feel supported within MVision as well.
“There’s a lot of pressure on me, being
behind two white candidates, which
would have been fine,” she said. “When
I was receiving a lot of negativity on the
outside of the campaign, and then inter-
nally, I began to lose faith in what we
were campaigning on. It started to feel
very disingenuous.”
McFarland, who is part of the Sexual
Assault Prevention and Awareness Cen-
ter, said she was interested in crafting
MVision’s sexual assault platform and
gravitated toward writing those policies,
but lost faith in the team after facing dis-
agreements with others from the party.
In particular, the Next Step Program
that MVision crafted in order to address
sexual assaults puts immense pressure
on survivors when it should be doing the
opposite, she said.
According to MVision’s website, the
Next Step Program aims to address the
needs of sexual assault survivors to be
heard, supported and protected at the
student organization, SAPAC and admin-
istrative level. This program was heavily
criticised by an op-ed in The Daily, in par-
ticular for its failure to hold Greek life on
campus accountable for its role in sexual
assault and the culture surrounding it.
McFarland tried to combat the policy,
she said, but MVision went forward and
incorporated it into their larger platform.
“I’ve been lectured on, ‘Oh, you can’t
run away from politics,’ but I think when
politics compromises your core values,
I think it’s definitely OK to take a step
back,” she said. “The Next Step Program,
when they were designing that, I really
don’t agree with a lot of the policy in
there … Like I said, it just began to feel
very disingenuous.”
Another thing that contributed to that
feeling was MVision’s use of Black celeb-
rities in their social media promotions.
In off-the-record conversations, mul-
tiple members of opposing campaigns
expressed the same discomfort.
One photo in particular that made her
uncomfortable was an image of former
President Barack Obama and first lady
Michelle Obama with a caption that stat-
ed, “Only 3 more days until election day …
Vote MVision.” The image was posted on
Snapchat by LSA junior Michael Heyward,
MVision’s co-campaign manager and a
Black man.
“I think it’s hard because Michael
and Caitlin ... I’m completely rooting for
them, but I think it’s hard for them to put
it in perspective,” McFarland said, refer-
ring to Heyward and LSA junior Caitlin
Christian, a Black woman and MVision’s
co-campaign manager. “We’re not the can-
didates. The candidates that are associated
with these pictures of Black people are two
white people. I think it’s hard to make that
connection as a campaign manager.”
Christian
said
that
accusations
of
tokenizing against their party were hurtful.
“I definitely think tokenizing has been
used for our campaign in a lot of situa-
tions,” she said. “People say Michael and
I are tokens, but that’s really disrespect-
ful because that’s kind of like saying,
‘You don’t deserve the position you’re in’
and that we’re just here because of our
identities. I don’t think that’s fair.”
As for the use of Black celebrities in
their promotional material, Christian
said they were simply using figures in
pop culture as a fun way to engage with
students on campus by using individuals
from media they are interested in.
“(They’re) people that we look up to
and I’m sure a lot of other people do,” she
said. “I don’t think it’s fair to say that it’s
tokenizing celebrities ... Saying that it’s
because they are Black, again just like
tokenizing people on our team, it takes
away from the fact that it’s just an (indi-
vidual) that we look up to.”
Using Black celebrities like Nicki
Minaj and Kanye West on posters is one
last attempt to grab voters that MVision
does not have, according to McFarland,
from demographics they were unable to
reach through their messaging.
“I think Izzy and Daniel are very
aware that they don’t have this empa-
thetic, genuine connection with (vot-
ers of color),” McFarland said. “Putting
out that propaganda with Black people’s
faces on them is a last attempt at getting
those votes.”
EMpower and MomentUM, McFar-
land said, garnered more support from
students of color and were doing more
outreach toward those students. She
said Public Health junior Lloyd Lyons,
eMpower’s candidate for president, had
face-to-face meetings with students in
Good Time Charley’s to speak with them
about a campus incident where a student
published a racially charged image on
Snapchat.
“MomentUM and eMpower are mak-
ing genuine attempts to connect with
their voters,” McFarland said.
AJ Ashman, an engineering junior and
MomentUM’s
presidential
candidate,
said both his and his running mate’s
identities as Black men contribute to
their campaign naturally being viewed as
more diverse.
“Most politicians don’t look like Char-
lie and I,” he said. “Most student govern-
ment leaders, I should say, I don’t look
like Charlie and I.”
T
he night before the Michigan
Daily CSG debate, Lyons of
eMpower shuffled through a
PowerPoint detailing his party’s mis-
sion and campaign. As the meeting
wrapped up and Lyons opened the room
for questions, one of his representative
candidates — who was in Greek life —
informed the room that his fraternity’s
president had told his fraternity broth-
ers to “vote for MVision since it’s the
Greek life party.”
“What are we supposed to say to that?”
he asked.
“Tell them we’re not just a party for
Greek life, we’re a party for everyone on
campus,” Lyons said.
Though members of opposing cam-
paigns casually referred to MVision as
a “Greek life party,” and the fact that its
presidential and vice-presidential candi-
dates were both involved in Greek life,
MVision denied this label.
“I think that we want to be more than
a Greek life party,” Public Policy senior
Josh Martin, MVision’s senior policy
advisor, said. “We obviously want to rep-
resent members of Greek life. They are a
big part of our campus … They have seri-
ous needs. There’s a lot of problems in
Greek life that need to be addressed.”
Martin said MVision was a party for
more than just Greek life on campus and
that the team was working to push issues
that will affect all students. Christian
added to this sentiment.
“I just want to add … A lot of members
on our core team aren’t involved in Greek
life,” Christian said.
Christian and Martin sat down togeth-
er for an interview on March 22, the last
day polls were open. The two of them
had spent the morning on the Diag, along
with representatives from MomentUM,
passing out fliers and encourage passers-
by to vote in the CSG elections.
“That dog though cannot win,” Chris-
tian said as she left the interview. “It’s so
embarrassing ... We, not just us but also
the other parties, have been outside cam-
paigning and trying our best to reach out
to students on campus.”
“That dog,” was Reggie the Campus
Corgi, a Pembroke Welsh corgi that fre-
quents campus and has over 5,000 friends
and followers on his Facebook page. The
week before voting began, students had
organized a grassroots write-in cam-
paign for their beloved Reggie as both
a joke and protest vote, catching fire on
social media and drawing press attention
from the likes of the Detroit Free Press
and Buzzfeed.
The Monday before voting began,
Michael Sola, Reggie’s owner and an Ann
Arbor resident, jokingly endorsed the
write-in campaign from Reggie’s Face-
book page. However, after voting had
been open for 15 hours, students per-
suaded him that his dog was disrupting
the other candidates and he urged Reg-
gie’s followers to vote for “humans” on
Facebook.
“As soon as they made me aware of that,
I realized the thing to do would be to go
ahead and end the campaign,” Sola said.
O
n election night, Reggie came
in fourth in the election with
1,403 votes, while Greene and
MVision won first place with a plural-
ity of votes, double the number of votes
earned by runner-up MomentUM.
Nonetheless, a dog had beaten four par-
ties, half of which were led by students
of color. On March 24, the day results
from the election were released, Sarkar
tweeted her disappointment at students
on campus and those from the press that
gave Reggie’s campaign coverage.
Business
sophomore
Michelle
Fan,
aMplify’s director of communications,
bemused that while it is important to prop-
erly advertise and market candidates, she
chalks up the election results to students’
lack of knowledge about how to vote.
“It’s all focused on names in the cam-
paign,” she said. “I think part of it is,
also on North Campus, it’s like also very
largely ignored.”
Fan said students who have most of
their classes on North Campus may feel
that CSG policies do not affect and apply
to them.
“They don’t really care about elections
necessarily, or because they’ve personal-
ly been ignored, so it’s not like a big point
for them to take out the effort to do it,”
she said.
The tendency to vote for candidates
like Reggie also stems from a mistrust of
CSG, she and several others who worked
on campaigns have said.
“I know that there are definitely some
aspects of CSG that are very problemat-
ic, of course, but I think when it comes
down to it, there are people who are run-
ning for a reason, and they’re running to
make a change with CSG, so it’s really
important to vote for them,” she said.
“But people just think, like, ‘Oh, noth-
ing’s going to happen.’”
This is a trend that is evident on the
national scale, Fan said.
“In the Asian-American community, voter
turnout is really low in the United States,”
she said. “If you’re ignored constantly, or you
don’t feel like anything’s going to change,
you have no motivation to vote.”
True Blue came in third in the CSG
elections, narrowly beating the dog by 63
votes. After multiple attempts to reach
Sabada for a comment on her experience
during elections, I did not get a response.
As for the accusations of tokenizing
against MVision, the tendency to use
individuals for their race and ethnicity as
a means to reach particular voter bases is
nothing new, Ashman said.
“They’re not viewed as contribut-
ing members of the assembly ... They’re
viewed as ‘Oh you’re going to bring me a
population of votes so that’s why we need
to engage, that’s why I need to talk to
you,” Ashman said.
He doesn’t know if there were any mer-
its to the allegations against MVision’s
marketing and can’t speak to their validi-
ty, but hopes that Greene and Baer rectify
the situation during their time in office.
“I think we have serious questions
about how a party that stands accused
of doing this thing can seriously lead
and change the culture of CSG that has
existed for years now that tokenizes stu-
dents of color when they stand accused
of doing what sounds like essentially the
same thing,” Ashman said.
Emma Richter/Daily
Engineering junior A.J. Ashman and LSA junior Charlie Binghman, then-CSG candidates for the MomentUM
party, speak at the CSG debate at the Michigan Daily on Thursday. March 15.
Emma Richter/Daily
LSA sophomore Marianne Drysdale and Business junior Arathi Sabada, then-CSG candidates for the True Blue
party, speak at the CSG debate at the Michigan Daily on Thursday. March 15.