GW Law students elected second-year law student Amanda Hichez as the Student Bar Association’s next president Monday.
Hichez, the SBA’s current Vice President of Finance, received 57.6 percent of the vote, beating current Executive Vice President Nigel Walton and former SBA Sen. Jo Slaughter by 280 and 191 votes, respectively. As SBA President, Hichez said she plans to create a comprehensive budget guide for student organizations and expand SBA programming to foster community among GW Law students.
SBA Sen. Quinn Biever defeated Omer Turkomer for executive vice president by 155 votes, securing 59.8 percent of the total vote. Biever said he will prioritize identity-based law student organizations in the SBA allocations process and grow SBA’s on-campus presence by expanded tabling and online communication.
GW Law students also elected 13 senators to join the body, leaving seven vacant seats for the upcoming term.
A total of 630 law students voted in this year’s election, according to unofficial election results the SBA elections commission released Tuesday morning — a 25.5 percent decrease from last year’s turnout of 791 voters. SBA elections operate via a majority voting system, requiring candidates to receive 50 percent of the vote to win.
Walton resigned from his current role as SBA executive vice president at the close of Tuesday’s SBA Senate meeting. He issued a resignation letter dated Feb. 14 sent to SBA President Cherissa Lindsay the Friday before the election. Walton’s letter refers to multiple deaths in his family as well as “false and defamatory” accusations of his character during the election period as reasons for departing from his position.
Lindsay nominated SBA Sen. Darrell Black to act as interim executive vice president until the senate confirms Biever to the position for the next term.
Last year, former Executive Vice President Kaitlin Fontana also ran for SBA president and lost to Raisa Shah, who shortly resigned over the summer.
The next SBA term will commence at an undetermined SBA Senate meeting in April according to Hichez.
