Three Student Government Supreme Court justices are in danger of being impeached for “willful disregard of statutes,” after issuing a ruling that disqualified Mark Lombardi-Nelson from the presidential race.
Sen. Jozef Gherman drafted a memo to impeach Russell Heller, Graham Reybitz and Kendel Mott. The memo accuses the justices of using power that does not belong to them to assess the violations made in Lombardi-Nelson’s campaign.
While the SG constitution grants the court “jurisdiction over all cases and controversies involving the student body and Student Government,” Gherman argues that while this gives the court power to hear any case, it does not necessarily give them the right to make a ruling.
After a hearing for Lombardi-Nelson on April 5, the court assessed its own points for the alleged violations. While the court does have the power to “reduce, reverse, or uphold points that were assessed to a campaign ticket,” there is no statute that says it can assess points that were not already given by the Election Rules Commission. Originally, the ERC assessed 10 points to the Lombardi-Nelson/Hegedus ticket. The Supreme Court assessed 33.32 points.
The court said it “applied the minor/major violation standard,” defined by the ERC; however, it assessed the maximum number of points possible for each violation. Where the ERC assessed two points for plagiarism, the court assessed 20. SG statutes say the value of each violation is at the discretion of the ERC.
By assessing its own point values, Gherman feels the court took the ERC’s power, granting itself “way more power than it’s supposed to have.”
Before presenting the memo of impeachment, Gherman sent an email to justices warning them of the violation he believed they were about to commit and providing possible solutions.
In a response email addressed to all of SG, Chief Justice Sean Ericson said, “…please understand that we are an independent body — we form our own conclusions, and we do not, to the best of our abilities, let external pressure bias our views…”
He then suggested efforts to improve the election process “be placed elsewhere, as there is plenty that needs to be changed in regards to our guiding documents…”
Though Ericson agreed with the court’s majority opinion, Gherman did not include him in the memo of impeachment.
Justice Alex Johnson, a freshman and the most recent addition to the court, was the only one with a dissenting opinion.
Johnson felt the case of Richards v. the ERC should have been dismissed form the start because Richards did not have the power to challenge the ERC’s decision to retract Lombardi-Nelson’s disqualification. SG statutes say that candidates can only appeal points that were assessed to their party, not those assessed to others.
Johnson said the court did not explicitly look at the statutes defined by the constitution, and for that there are consequences. Though interpretation of guidelines varied, he believes the intent for justice was shared among the court.
In a SG general assembly on April 10, Sens. Debra Buschman, Cory Santero and Anthony Patterson were appointed to determine the merit of Gherman’s memo. If the committee finds validity in the accusations made against the justices, it will develop a standard operating procedure to share with the rest of senate.
There are no existing guidelines for this kind of committee. With the exception of the first meeting, all deliberations will be public. If the senate uses the same process of impeachment that is does for senators, it will take a supermajority vote for each justice to be impeached. There is no timeline in place for the committee’s decision.
