I won the student body election.
And I did not barely win, either. I won the election by the highest margin of victory ever recorded for a ticket in the history of Notre Dame. And yet, they want you to believe that we lost.
You might have seen coverage that three tickets ran, and yes, it might be true that I did not formally submit to be listed on the ballot, but don’t listen to the fake news media that want you to believe that Njomo and Bisner won. I ran as the fourth ticket and I won the election by a landslide.
Because they want to take away our victory, I have no choice but to contest the results of the election. I might have technically lost by a total of 4,300 votes, but I feel a mandate from the support of my followers. So, in the name of justice for my party (our slogan was “Make Newfs Great Again”), I have submitted multiple cases to the Notre Dame Judicial Council regarding the blatant fraud that occurred during this student body election (which, you must admit, seems to happen every election cycle at Notre Dame anyways). The first case pertains to the blatant fraud and bias of Google forms. I cannot believe how unfair it is to sign into your email, click on a candidate name and press submit. The Google form is a method of aggregating mass opinion weaponized by the radical Google users and the people who use your dorm’s listserv to ask you to fill out a sloppy poll they made at the last second for their classes (also, my name did not show up on the form so it must have been altered somehow). I told my supporters not to vote using the form that was provided. The only accurate way to vote for our student body president is in-person, so imagine my surprise when they told me that voting would be conducted by following a link sent to our emails. That isn’t the end of the story, either. I received word from my officials that baskets upon baskets of votes for the other tickets were carried down from the mysterious third floor of Hesburgh Library and counted hours after the deadline to submit your vote had passed.
The second case I am filing calls for a recount of the votes so that the thousands of fabricated ballots for the other tickets will be tossed out. I heard news that students were creating dozens of fake email accounts to bolster the numbers for the other tickets. In the most egregious case of fraud that I heard, a vote for the winning ticket was cast by a certain and anonymous “Father Sorin.” That didn’t stop me from declaring victory, however. Even after Njomo and Bisner were announced as the winners of the election, I wrote and delivered a beautiful acceptance speech to massive crowds in front of Hesburgh, the largest crowds ever to cover the library quad for any event, in fact.
Finally, I submitted a brief to the Notre Dame Judicial Council asking them to demonstrate their loyalty to the true winner of the election and overturn its results, which they politely refused to do. At this point in time, I have no choice but to climb the ranks of authority and appeal to Caesar. I am personally calling on Father Jenkins, who I saw handing out roses to passerby at Monterrey’s the other day, to decertify the results of the student body election and recognize that I won.
By all accounts, everyone agrees that I not only won this student body election, but won it by massive numbers. In fact, all we have been doing is winning. I won the student body election this year, and I ran the last three years and won big in all those elections as well. It is a little-known fact that I also ran 32 simultaneous campaigns to be president of every single dorm, but they denied that we won. In fact, I declare victory in every single election that you can think of ever occurring during your time at the University.
So, as your newly elected student body president, I want to let you know that my office will be located on the now barely frozen over St. Mary’s Lake. I have been told by various officials that the ice will hold my large mahogany desk where I have a button installed to order a Rohr’s steak whenever I feel like it (one finds ways to enjoy these things even outside in the cold weather). Meetings by appointment only. Forgive the fact I can’t remember my secretary’s name. Actually, I never had a staff to begin with. Make Newfs Great Again.
Gabriel Niforatos is a senior majoring in political science with minors in the Hesburgh Program in Public Service and Theology. He is passionate about giving a voice to the disenfranchised and writing is the muse he is persistently chasing. He can be found at gniforat@nd.edu or @g_niforatos on Twitter.
I won the student body election
The views expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of The Observer.
