One Tech won every remaining executive seat, beating out competing bloc Experience Where It Counts, in the widely anticipated Student Government Association runoff, the SGA announced Friday evening.
In the presidential race, Hayden Hatch captured nearly 150 more votes than his opponent, Tyler Frevert.
President-elect Hayden Hatch said record voter turnout among students helped his campaign, and he was pleased his campaign received support from students who had big ideas.
2014 SGA executive candidates from the One Tech bloc celebrating their victory in the runoff election.
“I look forward to higher and higher turnouts from now on,” he said, “and with that, with those high turnouts, brings the ideas, and that’s what always should win an election, and I think that’s what won it this time.”
Hatch said the team’s plans for their first day as leaders of student government are still up in the air as they come to terms with what their positions mean for Texas Tech.
“So, the first day in office,” Hatch said, “I think we’re just going to be overwhelmed with, honestly, the magnitude of what we’re going to be able to do for the student body.”
Hatch said the hard-fought campaign and close election will be a lesson for the incoming cabinet to learn as they take their positions in office.
Newly elected external vice president, Stetson Whetstone, had a close margin of victory, capturing 51 more votes than his competitor, Peter Brady.
“I knew if I put my faith in them and they put faith into me, we could pull it out,” he said, “but it was definitely a relief big time. Our time, work and effort went into this, and I’d choose no one else but these two people with me to run side by side with.”
Whetstone, a Phi Gamma Delta member, said he hoped to make his big brother in the fraternity proud by succeeding in SGA.
“My big brother in the fraternity was external vice president – Mike Uryasz – and just want to follow his steps, and he’s the one that really brought me into this whole SGA experience, and I just wanted to try to live up to his expectations,” Whetstone said. “Hopefully, I feel like I did now.”
Despite Whetstone and his running mate BaLeigh Waldrop, the newly elected internal vice president, being down in numbers after the initial election, he said a pick-up in campaigning efforts secured their victory.
“This last week of campaigning was the most important week of campaigning,” Whetstone said. “Since BaLeigh and I both were down, we knew we had definitely had to pick it up even more and spend more hours, which was all worth it just to ensure the win, which overall, it’s a great feeling.”
Whetstone was trailing in last week’s initial election to Brady by only 2 percentage points – Brady initially secured 37 percent of the vote for external vice president.
It was a close finish for the seat of internal vice president, with BaLeigh Waldrop claiming a win by just four votes.
Waldrop had high praise for her internal vice presidential opposition, Taylor Shackelford.
“I had a great, great competitor in Taylor, and he would have done an awesome job,” Waldrop said, “but that being said, I’m really excited to have the spot.”
Waldrop was also lagging in the race for internal vice president after the first election, behind Shackelford by 5 percentage points.
Luke Cotton, the outgoing student body president, said he was surprised at the close race for internal vice president.
“To my knowledge, I’ve never heard of any race being that close,” Cotton said. “I’ve heard of a race being decided by about 60 votes, and that was for Zach West vs. Alex Alston [in 2012]. But four votes – I’ve never heard of anything that close before. It was a great thing to be a part of history.”
SGA Director Mike Gunn, accompanied by current SGA President Luke Cotton and Internal Vice President Jill Berger, reading the 2014 runoff election results.
Cotton also noted that candidates from One Tech’s campaigns made a comeback after the initial election.
“With the presidential candidate, he had won his first round,” Cotton said, “but the other two positions essentially had a comeback from the initial primary election and had a straight victory for One Tech in the general election.”
Cotton said records were set for voter turnout in a runoff election, which he said shows how engaged students are.
“It would be safe to assume this is the highest voter turnout we’ve ever had for a runoff election, as well,” Cotton said. “So that means a lot to me that students are engaged in this and care about who their elected officials are.
Experience Where It Counts presidential candidate Tyler Frevert had no regrets following the announcement of winners, and said he was pleased with the ultimate result of the elections – student involvement.
“We’ve got all summer to collaborate and push towards our goals that we set all along, and this administration is a good example of how a very tough election can still make it a great executive cabinet, and that’s what we have now.”
“A huge burden has been lifted off my shoulders, and all the stress that comes with that,” Frevert said. “I’m really proud of both teams, record turnout again, that’s phenomenal. At the end of the day, that’s what this is all about: getting students involved with this university.”
Of his competitors, Frevert said he recognized their efforts and that all the campaigns worked hard.
“I have the utmost respect for those guys and girls,” he said. “They’re just great people. I talked to Hayden a lot tonight. Both teams gave a 150 percent; we didn’t sleep, we went for it.”
Frevert said despite being able to make conjectures about the results of the runoff, he was still hit with some unexpected nerves.
Experience Where It Counts’ graduate vice presidential candidate, Pradeep Attaluri, won his election last week.
The initial election saw three campaigns competing, and after Connect Tech was knocked out of the runoff last week, it lent its official support to One Tech by endorsing them publicly.
Evan Dixon contributed to this report.
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