Student Government executive alliance election results were officially announced Thursday night, resulting in a runoff election set to take place between candidates Kevin Helgren and Binna Kim and fellow candidates Kallen Dimitroff and Jesse Guadiana.
Runoff elections occur when no alliance wins a majority of the vote. This election’s total vote count was 6,667, with Helgren-Kim receiving 35.77 percent of the vote and Dimitroff-Guadiana receiving 28.99 percent.
Kevin Helgren, student body presidential candidate and neuroscience and psychology senior, said he and Kim are excited to be moving into a runoff.
“I think it’s going to be challenging simply because we’re asking the student body to vote for a third time,” Helgren said. “We were also hesitant about this new election, but I think we were able to harness just as much support this time around.”
Kim, student body vice presidential candidate and marketing junior, said she and Helgren spent months thinking about their campaign.
“We worked so hard for so long, and we got to see numbers and the outcome of our work,” Kim said.
Kallen Dimitroff, student body presidential candidate and government and history senior, said she is proud of the work her team put into the campaign.
“I think it’s amazing that we got to the place we have,” Dimitroff said. “We have a lot of hard work in front of us, but I think we can pull it off. I think we can work towards creating a more positive environment in this election, and people can look forward to seeing a different side of campaign. I think everyone will get to know me and Jesse a lot better.”
Public relations sophomore Kasey French said she thinks SG can learn from this year’s election process.
“I think a lot of us were expecting a runoff,” French said. “It really should be fighting a clean fight, and I hope candidates in the future can take this in stride and say, ‘Look — we’re all aiming to make this university better together.’”
Daniel James Chapman, former student body presidential candidate and economics and mathematics senior, said he is disappointed by the results, but is happy with the work he and his running mate Austin James Robinson put into reinventing their campaign.
After the original election results were nullified, Chapman and Robinson changed their platform to include the idea of abolishing SG if it does not experience culture change within the next year. Chapman said the change in their campaign was a result of looking at the history of SG as a whole within the past 10 years.
“Although the culture has improved, I think there needs to be a conversation about the effectiveness and usefulness of SG,” Chapman said.
Voting for the runoff election will take place at utexasvote.com Wednesday and Thursday. Results will be announced in front of the tower at 6:30 p.m. Thursday.
