Manfre wins AS election

From Staff Reports

Juniors Rachel Manfre and Umang Desai won Tuesday's Associated Students election in a landslide victory, becoming next year's president and vice president, respectively.

The duo, whose platform focused on increased visibility of students and relations between off-campus students and the surrounding community, found out about their victory Wednesday morning.

"I was shocked and thankful and extremely excited," said Manfre, a community facilitator who was studying with about a dozen residents for a midterm when she received a phone call from Desai after he read the e-mail with the results.

The two won a commanding 60.79 percent of the vote, with the more evenly matched tickets of Casey Elder and Caroline Morrissey winning 18.98 percent, and Meagan Diss and Ben Childs winning 18.7 percent.

Manfre and Desai beat out closest competitors Elder and Morrissey by 41.81 percent, making it unnecessary to hold a run-off election, which would have been required if no candidate won by at least 25 percent.

"I thought for sure there would be a run-off," Manfre said. "(My opponents) were great candidates as well."

Manfre credits the experience she and Desai brought to the table as one of their best strengths. One of her priorities is to revamp the student feedback tool, Be Heard.

"We just want (Be Heard) to be available and applicable to all students," said Manfre. "We want to market Be Heard in a totally different way."

Also elected on Tuesday were senate chair Christopher Freeburg; senior senators Emily Stewart and John Michael Reyes; junior senators Nick Duston, Richelle Neal and David Bass; and sophomore senators Andrew Lam, Nick Ukropina, Mariesa Kubasek, Ben Saulson and Christopher Mosier.

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