Student Bar Association Executive Vice President Nigel Walton resigned effective immediately at the end of Tuesday’s senate meeting, citing recent family deaths and bullying during the SBA election.
Walton, who lost the race for SBA president in Monday’s election to Vice President of Finance Amanda Hichez, said he sent his resignation letter to SBA President Cherissa Lindsay last Friday, where he detailed his experience of losing two family members in the past month and “deeply troubling character attacks” from law students throughout the election. He said he planned to resign regardless of the election results and would not have accepted the presidency.
Walton alleged that voters used racial stereotypes toward him throughout the election period, which he said made it “impossible” for him to continue serving in the body.
“When there are emails harassing me and emails that are I would say mischaracterizations of a racial undertone, then I have a problem with that,” Walton said at the meeting. “You can attack me on anything else but first and foremost, I’m a Black man.”
Walton said he valued the time he spent in the SBA and hopes the initiatives the body worked on during his tenure will continue to benefit law students.
SBA President Lindsay nominated SBA Sen. Darrell Black to assume the role of executive vice president for the remainder of the term until Executive Vice President-elect Sen. Quinn Biever takes the reins in April. SBA senators unanimously approved Black as the interim executive vice president at the end of the meeting.
The SBA Senate unanimously passed the Flights for International Families Act to deduct $1,000 from the current ad hoc budget for ten donations to supplement the flight costs for the families of international students who will be traveling to D.C. for GW Law’s graduation in May. SBA Sen. Marcella Rubini, who introduced the bill, said the SBA will hold a raffle for law students to enter to receive one of ten available $100 travel stipends.
SBA Sen. Omer Turkomer, the chair of the SBA Finance Committee, introduced the Student Organization Fundraising Act, which would restrict the SBA Finance Committee’s ability to use a student organization’s fundraising amount as a negative metric in determining their budget allocation for the year. He said under current finance policy, the committee will deduct the amount an organization has left over in their budget from their overall budget for the year.
“We’re requiring these student orgs to fundraise, but on the other hand, we’re restricting, or basically penalizing them for fundraising by reducing their budget allocations by the amount they funded,” Turkomer said.
Turkomer also presented an amendment to the act, which would eliminate the bylaw that requires student organizations to fundraise to be eligible for SBA funding the following year.
The SBA Senate voted to table the bill to the next senate meeting because of disagreement among SBA senators about rescinding the fundraising requirement. Rubini said requiring student organizations to hold fundraising events helps organizations bond and boost their budgets.
SBA President Cherissa Lindsay announced that the SBA began selling tickets for the annual Barrister’s Ball Monday, which will continue until March 13. She said the event ball will be March 14 at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Adams Morgan and include a DJ and a photo booth for attendees to use throughout the event.
Lindsay said the SBA will offer presale tickets for the ball for $80 to $90 and the general sale will go for $90 to $100. She said she met with the GW Law Finance Office last week and received a discount on the total venue cost.
“We were offered a great deal that we couldn’t turn down,” Lindsay said. “So we did receive a $100,000 credit on the venue, so the venue will cost us about $92,000 instead of the $200,000 so that’s good.”
SBA senators spent a total of $1,855.49 in funding on six ad hoc bills to cover student costs for attending law conferences and reimbursements for law student organizations.
The SBA will hold its next meeting March 11 at 8:50 p.m.
