Updated: April 9, 2025, at 12:45 p.m.
Student Government Association presidential candidate Dan Saleem terminated his campaign during Tuesday’s election debate, citing “virtual and in-person attacks” on people close to him.
Saleem, a junior who lost his first bid for the presidency in 2024, said during his opening statement that “attacks” on his family, girlfriend and women in his campaign team led him to withdraw from the race. Saleem’s announcement came hours after he appeared to deny allegations from an anonymous letter published by the GW’s Students Against Sexual Assault that accused “someone running” of sexual assault and domestic violence.
Saleem took the debate stage Tuesday evening alongside his two opponents and ended his candidacy during his two-minute opening statement. Saleem said he tolerated people allegedly vandalizing his posters and making jokes, but “what wasn’t okay” was people targeting his family, girlfriend and female campaign members.
“I’m dropping out because we’ve reached the point where misinformation and rumors have upended the lives of the people I love,” Saleem said in his opening statement.
Saleem did not mention sexual assault allegations or address the SASA letter during his remarks. He stood up and exited the room after finishing his statement, followed by a group of his supporters sitting in the audience. The room erupted into claps and cheers after they left.
The writer of the SASA letter stated in the Instagram post that they are “actively pursuing” a Title IX case against a candidate for sexual assault and domestic violence.
The student who wrote the letter — who requested anonymity due to the ongoing Title IX case — said the candidate referred to in the letter was Saleem.
Saleem did not immediately respond to request for comment regarding the Title IX case.
The Hatchet obtained a copy of a letter sent to the student by GW’s Title IX Office that confirmed the writer of the SASA letter filed a formal complaint against Saleem. The portion of the letter obtained by The Hatchet doesn’t include the status or context of the complaint.
In an Instagram post Tuesday afternoon responding to the letter posted by SASA, Saleem said he has never been the “perpetrator of any sexual violence.” He said he is a survivor of sexual and dating violence and abuse and that his “assailant” had “retaliated” against him in an attempt to “defame” him.
He also invited students to ask him questions about the allegations in-person at Columbian Square between 4 and 6:30 p.m. Tuesday — just before the debate — adding that he has “facts and proof.”
Last month, Saleem denied Title IX allegations made against him during last year’s election, writing via Instagram that he “never” had official charges brought against him and that none of the claims made against him were “legitimate or fact based.”
He included a screenshot of an email from the Title IX Office, dated March 21, which stated that the Office holds no “disciplinary record” associated with his name at GW.
The student who wrote the SASA statement said they decided to reach out to the organization and pen the statement because of Saleem’s Instagram post.
The student said Saleem’s inclusion of the March 21 email from the Title IX Office “misrepresented” information because Title IX disciplinary records exclude ongoing formal investigations “by definition.”
The Hatchet confirmed the student filed the Title IX complaint against Saleem prior to the March 21 email that he posted.
“It was such a blatant lie, and him basically calling me a liar, that I just had to clear the record,” the student said in an interview. “Because then people, I feel like, invalidate my story and my experiences with them. So then I just wanted something to clear it all up. Like, expose the fact he’s a liar.”
The Hatchet also obtained a copy of a letter sent to Saleem by GW’s Title IX Office that confirmed the Office had received a formal complaint on March 7 from him against the student who wrote the letter. Saleem said in a message that the complaint filed against him was “retaliatory” because the student who wrote the letter discovered he was considering filing a Title IX complaint against them but that at the time Saleem had filed a complaint out of “respect for her privacy” and their “no contact” relationship.
“It saddens me that this individual tried to make themselves the victim, ruin my reputation on false pretenses as well as use such a sensitive topic,” Saleem said in a text message.
The student who wrote the letter to SASA said they initially met with the Title IX Office in September 2024 and said they chose to focus on receiving supportive measures instead of starting the resolution process until February. The student said their decision to file a complaint was in “no way” retaliatory and that Saleem would not have known about their decision to file a complaint because they had not been in contact with him or anyone associated with him.
Documents obtained by The Hatchet confirm that the student met with Title IX in September 2024 to discuss supportive measures.
“This is not an attempt to defame him; this is me telling my story after he claimed to have no charges against him,” the student said in a message.
Saleem said in a text message that his decision to drop out “roots” from the need to protect the safety of his girlfriend, family and female members of his team who had received personal attacks from students.
“We believe the [SASA] letter incited these attacks on my loved ones, but I’ll be clear that I did not back down from the misinformation being spread,” Saleem said in a message.
In his second bid for presidency, Saleem ran on a platform of further subsidizing the cost of morning-after contraceptive pills, halving the size of the SGA’s executive cabinet and increasing transparency with the SGA’s finance allocations process for students.
Saleem said during an interview in late March that he served as a sexual assault and sexual harassment officer when he served in the military before attending GW, adding that he was responsible for conducting investigations into sexual misconduct cases, as well as providing support to survivors.
He ran for SGA president last year, coming in third place behind Lauren K. Harris and Ethan Fitzgerald.
In his first presidential campaign, Saleem’s platform focused on dining reform, expanding accessibility on the Mount Vernon Campus and pushing University officials to accept transfer credits from students who served in the military.
Saleem faced disqualification in the 2024 campaign season after the Joint Elections Commission initially charged him with six penalty points for collecting signatures prior to the official campaign period. The JEC ultimately retracted one count, permitting him to continue his bid for the presidency.
This post was updated to include the following:
This post was updated to include that Saleem filed a Title IX complaint against the student who penned the letter to SASA and to include a comment from Saleem regarding the Title IX complaint filed against him. This post was also updated to include comments from the student who wrote the letter regarding the Title IX complaint filed by Saleem.
