A knee shaking, toe tapping Lazaro “Laz” Cardenas sat visibly nervous in the ASUNM senate hall waiting for 8 p.m., when the ASUNM election results would be tallied — not knowing he would be elected the next ASUNM president by more than 400 votes.
“I was feeling nervous anticipation to know who won,” Cardenas said. “To be honest I am just grateful for everyone’s support and help. We couldn’t have done it without them.”
Cardenas brought in 1,223 votes compared to his opponent on the Wolf Pack slate David Conway’s 795. Cardenas’ running mate, Joseph Colbert, also won as vice president. Colbert was absent from the announcement because he was celebrating his birthday, Cardenas said.
“I couldn’t have done it without each and everyone that was out there,” Cardenas said. “That includes members of senate that were running, the volunteers that we had, all the student organizations that endorsed me and basically everyone that went out and voted. It feels good but at the same time there is a lot of work to be done.”
Cardenas attributed the win to both the progressive style of campaigning and the caliber of ideas that he ran on.
“Just these new ideas that the slate has done,” Cardenas said. “We created a video and an ad campaign that was really cool … I just feel our volunteers did a great job.”
A total of 2,115 students voted in this year’s election. Election Commissioner Brian Moore said the numbers were the highest he had seen the last five years. And Conway even mentioned how big the turnout was. The election represented about 11 percent of the undergraduate student body.
Earlier this week, Cardenas received endorsements from 10 student organizations compared to five for Conway. But Cardenas’ slate didn’t win the battle of Facebook friends. The Wolfpack slate had nearly 300 more friends than did Full Circle, which may have contributed to the Wolfpack slate getting seven of the 10 senators voted in.
Conway said it’s not bittersweet that his slate was mostly voted in despite his loss.
“It’s all sweet,” he said. “I believe in each and every one of them. That is why I didn’t leave when the presidential numbers were heard. I stayed throughout the whole thing because it means a lot to me seeing (my slate) get on. It was about the message. It was about what we were doing. It was not about me.”
Student and volunteer Xavier Winslow said that he voted for senators on both slates even though he helped campaign for Full Circle.
“I do think having a mix is better because that means it is covering a lot more subjects and not just like three key issues that they can bring to the table,” Winslow said.
BAMAnd for the last five semesters, there has been some sort of discrepancy within the election, which ended in a contest of election or the threat of one. Conway said he would just have to wait and see but didn’t see any violations Wednesday.
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“We may hear something crazy tonight and whatever happens,” Conway said “We will figure out what is going on. If something crazy happened or some super breach, we will fight it. I see two hard-fought, positive campaigns.”
Cardenas also said he felt the election was clean.
“I think it was. I hope that if there is a contest of election it is for a legitimate reason,” Cardenas said. “Everyone has the right to contest an election.”
Cardenas finished with a teaser about what students should expect from his administration next year.
“Get ready. It is going to be fun,” he said.
