Students head to polls for second day of SG elections

Last Tuesday, as many students fled Gainesville in anticipation of Hurricane Milton, around 5,000 others turned out to cast their ballots in Student Government election races at polling locations across campus.

Today, polls reopened, marking the second and last day of voting for the Fall 2024 SG election.

Three parties have slated candidates for some or all of the 50 Senate seats available this election: Vision Party, Change Party and Watch Party.

Tanvi Shah, a 20-year-old UF political science sophomore, plans to vote in SG elections for the first time this year. She said she supports Change but doesn’t yet know which candidates she will choose.

“I do appreciate the fact that they point out the hypocrisies within the Vision Party of where they’re allocating their funds,” Shah said.

She thinks both parties should use less aggressive methods to encourage students to vote, she said.

Gretta Burke, a 19-year-old UF pre-nursing sophomore, also plans to vote in student government elections for the first time but is unsure she will be able to make it to the polls. She said she has to study for an upcoming exam, so her busy schedule may prevent her from making her way to the ballot box.

“I don’t really know the candidates specifically,” she said. “As a party, though, I like Change more, and it’s not even necessarily because I know what they stand for as much as I’m against what Vision stands for.”

Burke said she’d like to see SG do more outreach to better understand what truly voters care about.

For his first ever election, Evan Hill, an 18-year-old UF biology freshman, said he decided to give his vote to Change because he felt its representatives presented the party the most professionally.

“Vision had a table outside Turlington Plaza, and I spoke with them,” Hill said. “They tried to connect with me on a student-o--udedentbbasis when I feel like they should’ve been professional in sharing their platform and what they had to offer.”

Sarah Chowdhury, a 22-year-old UF psychology major, also voted in a student government election for the first time this year. Last year, she felt disconnected from the candidates because she rarely saw them outside of tabling.

This year she was able to connect with Change candidate Priya Schramm “without the pressure” of buying a Tshirt opromising to vote for a certain candidate.endyll Campi, a 19-year-old UF health science freshman, was eager to vote in her first SG election. She voted for Change because she felt the party was more transparent with its views and goals.

She liked that it advocated for 24/7 Marston and more funding for student organizations.

“I hope that whatever they [Change] do, they put the students first…and stay close to what they want with what they advocate for,” she said.

Ethan Czech, an 18-year-old UF mechanical engineering freshman, decided to vote for the first time after seeing students tabling near the Honors Village in support of Vision, which led him to vote for the party.

“I just had way more information about them than the other party,” Czech said. “I don’t think I’ve ever talked to anyone from Change Party.”

Dean Fioravanti, an 18-year-old UF accounting freshman, cast his vote for Vision candidate Raustin Esfahanizadeh after Esfahanizadeh helped the freshman in getting his bike repaired by introducing him to the UF SG Bike Repair Shop.

“He was really nice,” Fioravanti said. “​​He told me about what he wants to do for the Murphree area… like the rain ponchos… [and] getting better ping pong paddles.”

Fioravanti said he got the impression that Esfahanizadeh really cares about the student body, which is why he voted for him.

Another student, Maybelle Perez-Medina, an 18-year-old UF computer science sophomore, was approached by Vision candidate Ava Rathet. After hearing Rathet’s initiatives for food and off-campus housing, Perez-Medina said she was convinced to vote for her.

Tyler Kroop, an 18-year-old UF economics freshman, voted for Vision candidate Dylan Cannella after hearing about his initiatives for the Graham area.

“[We live] in a dorm, an older one, [and] he wants to help out,” Kroop said. “[He wants to] get better laundry rooms, which I think is really good for us. He wants to do ice machines for the dorms, which I like a lot.”

Mark Szomstein, an 18-year-old computer science freshman, said he hopes the election results will encourage more unity amongst the student body at UF, he said. He voted for Vision.

Similarly to Szomstein, David Soto, an 18-year-old UF political science freshman, said Vision’s initiatives were better aligned with his beliefs. He did not agree with Change’s platform point regarding inclusivity spaces and said it was a part of their political agenda.

“I’m from California, and I don’t want another California college here,” Soto said.

Natalia Parras, a 19-year-old mathematics sophomore, voted for Change. She thinks Vision is more representative of Greek life, she said.

Parras voted Change because she saw the platform wanted to unionize campus workers, she said.

“When UF is such a big institution, I think it’s good to have a representative for yourself,” she said.

Turner Mooney, a 20-year-old finance junior, voted for Vision. As a member of Alpha Tau Omega, he voted to support his friends who are running.

“It’s important to have the right people in the right positions so everyone gets equal representation,” he said. “We need to have the best policies put in place for Greek life, events and how students should be going about campus.”

Mooney said he hopes students are happy about who they are voting for.

This is a developing story. Check back in for updates.

Natalie Kaufman, Juliana DeFilippo, Delia Rose Sauer, Avery Parker, Annie Wang and Sara-James Ranta contributed to this report.