Horizon slate candidate Chris Lange dropped his bid to run for Associated Students Inc. executive vice president after the threat of a possible legal battle over the election code.The Election Complaint Committee ruled in favor of Lange on April 13 in his appeal to regain eligibility to run in the ASI election.

Student Affairs had initially ruled Lange, a member of the Sacramento State basketball team, ineligible to run for ASI executive vice president after turning in his election paperwork minutes after the application deadline.

But the Election Complaint Committee overturned that decision, stating the election code, which spells out guidelines for the election process, is too vague in its requirements for filing candidate paperwork.

The next step for Lange would have been to appeal to the Appellate Council, which would have had the final say on whether he could be deemed eligible to run.

Lange decided on Monday he did not want to go through with the process after being informed that he may have to go to court with ASI over the election complaint committee’s recommendation.

“It would be such a long process,” Lange said. “I’m going to say no thank you because it’s so late.”

The Election Complaint Committee recommended to the Appellate Council that the election for the executive vice president’s position be pushed back to a later date, in order to give Lange time to campaign.

The ASI elections end tonight at 7:30 p.m.

Members of the ASI board voted to seek legal counsel to evaluate the Election Complaint Committee’s decision, to find out if ASI would be vulnerable to a lawsuit from other candidates that may be against moving the election back.

Current Vice President of Academic Affairs Luke Wood informed the board that ASI could be in jeopardy of a lawsuit because the election code states the Election Complaint Committee can only rule on actual candidates seeking appeal.

Wood and Angel Barajas, ASI executive vice president, argued that since Lange is not currently an eligible candidate, the complaint committee should not have ruled on his complaint.

“The committee went outside their jurisdiction on what they can rule on,” Wood said. “I think we should freeze the ruling.”

While the ASI board did not agree with Wood’s idea for freezing the committee’s ruling, it did agree to seek legal counsel to ensure it is not vulnerable to a lawsuit.

Candidates who are currently eligible for executive vice president could contend that they have a strong argument for a lawsuit if the election is pushed back to a later date.

“All the rights of candidates running need to be taken into consideration,” said James Shelby II, the current vice president of finance and executive vice president candidate on the Access slate.

Shelby, seeing a conflict of interest in discussing the issue, dismissed himself from the board meeting’s vote to seek legal counsel.

Shelby said he wasn’t interested in seeking a lawsuit if the Appellate Council ruled to let Lange run.

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Greg Hyatt can be reached at [email protected]