Last week, Student Body President Jonathan Kaufman was recommended for acquittal by the Court of Impeachment, a temporary committee overseeing impeachment proceedings.
In the impeachment hearing Monday night in the Russell House theater, Kaufman was found not guilty of the original charge of failure to nominate an Elections Commissioner within two weeks of his presidential inauguration. Evidence showed that Kaufman nominated third-year sociology and Russian student Cory Alpert on time.
Courtesy of SGTV
Chief Justice of the Constitutional Council Ross Abbott issued a statement to the Court of Impeachment on Oct. 12.
“...the codes surrounding the appointment of an elections commissioner are imperfectly constructed and require revision,” Abbott said. “We do not believe that an impeachment would be justified by this flawed section of the codes in their current state.”
The Court and the Student Senate reconvened for another a special session of Student Senate, called by Student Body Vice President Lee Goble, to vote for either Kaufman’s official acquittal or his removal from office.
The Senate moved to concur with the acquittal recommendations. This was decided by a 37 to 1 vote. The one vote in favor of impeachment was from Sen. Zachary Kirby, who initially brought up the charge against Kaufman.
Kirby was approached by the Daily Gamecock for a statement, but preferred not to comment on the situation.
“I think the vote kind of speaks for itself,” third-year biochemistry and molecular biology student and Sen. Izlen Peksenar said.
The Court, the Senate and several members of the student body were in attendance. Goble read over the outline of the recommendation for impeachment, and then a vote was cast by the 38 student senators.
Upon the Senate’s concurrence with last week's hearing, Kaufman is now officially acquitted from the impeachment charges. There is also a new confirmed Elections Commissioner as of last week, second-year insurance and risk management student Alexandra Badgett.
“We try not to let this hinder our efforts to serve the student body," Goble said. “We had to spend time dealing with this where we would’ve spent time serving the student body, but now it’s back to business.”