The Election Committee has released its decision regarding an allegation against candidate John Anderson.

Eds: Apologies for the delay in posting this story, which was first received on 14 Feb 2005.

The text of the decision is as follows:

Election Committee Decision February 11, 2005

On February 8th, an allegation was made that candidate John Andersen violated section G.1.b of the Election Procedure based on statements made in his website’s campaign blog.

The allegation pertains to a conversation between the alleger and Mr. Andersen that was then made public on his campaign website’s blog.

The alleger states the following occurred after the Feds Media Forum:

“Leaving that forum I did not feel good about my performance because I did lose my temper and became aggressive. That evening I decided to call John up to talk. In that conversation we discussed the forum, and I mentioned to him that I was not pleased with my handling of that forum, and how going into the elections I didn’t want to go down that route, and that I hope I didn’t offend him in anyway, and if I did that was not my intention, and I apologize.”

Some time after that conversation took place, a blog entry on www.uwvotes.com, authored by Mr. Andersen, reported in part the following:

“Hi everyone, I know a lot of you have been approaching me upset with the way many of this year's candidates have been behaving. I would like to make my stance CLEAR...I am not interested in running a campaign based on slandering the other candidates. Running a smear campaign without substance only disenfranchises our student body. This election should be about issues, and the future of the Federation. In no way should this election resemble the adolescent bickering of a junior high school election. I know that running an election campaign can bring out the worst in people, but there is no excuse to disrespect one another. To date, the only candidate that has apologized to me for her behaviour was [alleger’s name removed by Election Committee], thanks [alleger’s name removed by E.C.], apology accepted…”

The alleger was made aware of this blog post and contacted Mr. Andersen, stating the following:

“I was just reading your blog…I really don’t appreciate putting my name up there at all. I talked to you the other day as a friend, and I should repeat that I did not apologize at all for what I said, I felt very strongly about that. I would appreciate it if you left my name out of your blogs, and personal conversations out of it too. If you could please get rid of that part of the blog, and don’t tell you can’t b/c I know you can. I don’t wish to be a part of your website, and I think you should respect private conversations. I know your intentions for putting that up on the blog were good, however I think some people may take things the wrong way as your comment was not very straightforward and incomplete.”

Mr. Andersen states that he responded to the alleger’s concerns by removing any reference to the alleger’s name appearing in his blog by replacing it with [blank]. To call attention to his actions and provide an explanation for his deletion of information on a public website, he added the following blog entry:

"To follow up on my last blog regarding the disrespectful behaviour of some of this years candidates, I was asked to modify my previous blog to remove the name identifying which candidate had appologized for their behaviour. I have done so to respect that individual's wishes, but believe that any sincere appology would be public, as the behaviour was public. I'm not terribly concerned about a personal apology, but am much more interested in seeing a change in behaviour. Time will tell."

Section G. of the Election Procedure reads partially as follows:

G. CAMPAIGNING PERIOD

1. Rules for candidates

b. No misrepresentation of another candidate’s statements.

When determining whether or not misrepresentation has taken place, the Election Committee must take into account several factors, the foremost being the original wording of the alleger’s statement versus what was publicized in the blog.

Neither the exact wording of the message nor the scope of the message was completely conveyed in Mr. Andersen’s blog statements. An open-ended statement about the alleger’s hopes that Mr. Andersen was not offended, and that if offence was felt, an apology was warranted, was turned into a specific statement apologizing for her behaviour, which was not the alleger’s intention. The alleger never admitted to an instance of disrespectful behaviour.

The Election Committee recognizes that statements made orally are subject to varying degrees of interpretation, and that mistakes in interpretation can be made honestly.

Mr. Andersen interpreted the alleger’s statement to be an apology for disrespectful behaviour when it was intended as a qualified admission of the alleger’s hopes that she had not offended him in any way as it was not her intention, and if she had, she apologized. Mr. Andersen’s publishing of those misinterpreted comments amounts to misrepresentation.

The Election Committee has therefore determined that Mr. Andersen has misrepresented the statements of the alleger and that he is in violation of the election procedure section G.1.b.

Mr. Andersen is hereby fined 15% of his spending limit, taking the form of a reduction in his spending limit of $67.50.

The Election Committee notes that its decision was not released in keeping with the timeline requirements of the election procedure, section H.2.a.