Brittany Benedict was elected the next president of Tempe Undergraduate Student Government on Thursday, after a runoff against Aundrea DeGravina.
The results were announced from Old Main at 1 p.m. on Thursday afternoon, one week after the runoff was announced.
Benedict and her ticket won with just under 56 percent of the vote, securing just under 400 votes more than DeGravina. Both tickets improved their voter turnout, with Benedict receiving 1,818 votes, and DeGravina receiving 1,432 votes.
“We are so so excited right now,” Benedict said. “It was a long three weeks so we’re very happy to have the results that we did.”
The Benedict ticket received the most votes in the original election, but fell short of the 51 percent needed to win it outright. DeGravina finished second in that election and closed the gap in the runoff.
This marks DeGravina’s second runoff loss; she lost to Brandon Bishop in the 2016 election.
President-elect Benedict received a boost in endorsements early in the week, with former opponent Kanin Pruter endorsing her ticket.
Read more: Kanin Pruter endorses Brittany Benedict for TUSG president
Benedict said she and her team will take some time to celebrate before getting to work, but did not indicate what would be first on her agenda.
Both tickets filed complaints against the other within the last two days, according to Nicole Delabarre, the assistant elections commissioner for the Tempe campus.
“In all honesty I think it was a way to try to disqualify the other ticket, which I think is disappointing because as much as it is an important election, it is just college,” Delabarre said. “Both tickets made complaints against each other, they were basically the same thing, about copyrighted materials, ASU materials being used.”
Delabarre said the complaints should not affect the outcome as both tickets made the same complaints against each other.
Benedict confirmed her ticket made two complaints and Dayton Potter, the DeGravina candidate for vice president of policy candidate, confirmed his ticket had also filed complaints.
“As far as I’m concerned there was some logo stuff … nothing that I deem to be too serious but that’s not really up to me, that’s up to higher powers,” Potter said.
Potter said the future is bright and congratulated the Benedict ticket on their victory.
“It was a learning experience regardless,” Potter said. “I just had a whole bunch of fun during this whole process.”
Here's the results!! pic.twitter.com/SUXWGfMFRv
— Mitch(ell) Atencio (@mitchellatencio) April 6, 2017
Reach the reporter at maatenci@asu.edu or follow @mitchellatencio on Twitter.
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