By McKay Coppins
The frontrunners in the BYUSA presidential election were disqualified Wednesday night, Mar. 8, 2006, after the administration ruled that they had violated a campaign budget rule.
Jason Linford and his running mate John Romney received the highest number of votes in the primary election but the victory was short lived, said Jason Black, a spokesman for the Linford campaign.
After requesting to look at the campaign's budget, the elections committee decided that Linford and Romney had used unfair advantage to stretch the $250 allotted to each campaign.
The campaign hired a small printing business with low prices to produce their flyers, Black said. Concerns surfaced, however, because the owner of the business was campaigning for Linford.
'There were no discounts at all for our campaign because that would have been very inappropriate,' Black said. 'The fact is the prices his business has are very low.'
But when the elections committee reviewed the budget, they decided to apply market value to the production of the flyers, calculating how much it would have cost them to go to a place like Kinkos. Under these calculations, the Linford campaign would have exceeded the allowed budget.
According to the election handbook, candidates and their campaign staffers are prohibited from spending personal money or using their position to gain unfair advantage.
Black said he thought the decision was unfair.
'There's no rule that says if you find a good business deal, you have to tell the other candidates about it or that you can't use it,' he said. 'If this price is available to anyone, why is that unfair?'
But while he disagrees with the decision, Black said the candidates aren't looking to make waves.
' were disappointed by the administration's decision and they thought that going to that business was perfectly acceptable and ethical,' Black said. 'But they support the administration and go along with their decision.'
Even before they were disqualified, the Linford campaign was plagued by infractions. In fact, as of Wednesday (Mar. 8), there had been 16 infractions filed against Linford and Romney, whereas the other two campaigns had none.
Aaron Linford, 18, from Mesa, Ariz., who volunteered on the campaign, said that most of the infractions were dismissed and that the other campaigns had become sloppy in filing them.
In one example he cited, the campaign was asked to remove several orange circles hanging in Heritage Halls. Those who filed the infraction thought the Linford campaign had hung the circles because they shared the campaign's color, and that they were violating posting rules. However, it was later discovered that the orange dots were part of a promotion for 'missionary week.'
'All it would have taken is a simple question,' Aaron Linford said. 'Every campaign has perceptions of shady dealings on the other side.'
It is unclear who filed these infractions, since, according to the rules, any student can report a campaign to the elections committee.
'I believe one person on our campaign filed an infraction without any of our knowledge,' said Mike Maughn, a BYUSA presidential candidate. 'I believe individual students who know the rules have filed some as well.'
Maughn said he believed the Linford campaign deserved to be disciplined in some instances.
'They have been punished on a few occasions just because they keep breaking rules,' said Maughn.
However, despite Linford and Romney being disqualified, Black said the two loved the experience and would do it all again.