Former AS VP for Governmental Affairs Ana Ramirez last June. A proposed change to the AS election code would prevent other undocumented students without DACA from running for the AS board. Hailey Hoffman// AS Review
By Erasmus Baxter
The AS Board of Directors will be discussing a potential change to the AS election code tomorrow that would prevent many undocumented students from running for the board.
The change would require students to provide proof of employment eligibility in order to run for the board. This is an issue for undocumented students who do not have DACA, a federal program that provides temporary work authorization to undocumented people who came to the U.S as children.
“It’s just one sentence that’s added in, and it changes everything,” said Vickey Matey, a member of Blue Group, an organization of undocumented students and allies. “…It completely eliminates the fact that, at one point, people wanted to work towards making sure we could find a way to support undocumented students, and to pay undocumented students.”
The change was sent to the board as part of a series of changes by the AS Elections Advisory Committee that updates the elections code each year,.
The committee is made up of eight students: six at-large, an AS board member and the AS Elections Coordinator, who chairs the committee.
Coordinator of Student Activities Casey Hayden serves as the non-voting adviser to the committee and said they want to be transparent and not give a false sense of opportunity.
“The main thrust of where [the committee] is coming from is avoiding having another difficult experience that our VP for governmental affairs had to deal with this year,” he said.
AS VP for Governmental Affairs Ana Ramirez, who was elected last Spring, was prevented from taking her position while she waited to get approved for DACA. Despite support from congress members to expedite her application, she resigned this month, still without DACA, citing a lack of support from the AS.
Out of respect for the student body’s decision to elect Ramirez the AS board has decided to ignore the bylaws and will not fill her position, they said in a statement read by AS President Simrun Chhabra at their last meeting. Ramirez received support from many students, faculty and alums who voiced their support and fundraised to help her pay cost of living expenses.
“People keep saying they want to help, they want to help, and then doing the exact opposite,” Matey said. “I think people forget that undocumented immigrants are exploited, especially in the labor force, and this is just perpetuating that exploitation and dehumanization that we face every day.”
Many undocumented people have said they have concerns about applying for DACA as they must provide their address, fingerprints and other information to the government as deportations spike. Though halted by a judge, the Trump adminstration has also made clear their intention to phase out DACA.
Congress’ lack of success in passing a replacement act makes the issues even more urgent for Matey.
“Now we’re seeing that we might not have that clean Dream Act that passes, [or the] opportunity to continue our work authorization,” Matey said. “Right now we need to find solutions. That’s what we need everyone to be doing– trying to find a solution and way to help, instead of immediately cutting undocumented people out.”
The AS Board can change the language as they wish, and will be the ones who ultimately approve it, Hayden said.
AS VP for Diversity Erick Yanzon said that they expects the board to have a discussion about the language at the meeting.
“It’s been an open problem that running for the board has been inaccessible to undocumented students,” they said.
They added that the committee is following a lot of policies they don’t have control over, and which are inherently unsupportive of undocumented students.
The core issue is that AS board members are considered employees, Hayden said.
“Lots of avenues have been explored to compensate undocumented students without DACA in any AS role and we keep hitting a lot of… legal hurdles we haven’t been able to clear,” Hayden said.
To hold a position on the AS board, one must meet the requirements outlined in the job description. While the description does not outright say that one must have work authorization, it is implied that it is a paid position by providing a pay rate and number of hours required to be worked, Hayden said.
This means the AS could face legal issues if it doesn’t follow federal employment rules which require work authorization. Paying students in cash, for example, to avoid requiring work authorization would still run into issues with the federal tax code.
Hayden said the idea was to change when the timing of reviewing employment eligibility was so candidates didn’t get stuck. Past candidate filing packets had asked if candidates had work authorization, and what they were doing to get it if not. While the election coordinator was supposed to verify eligibility before the election, the idea is that they would now verify it before candidates file to run.
If the rules weren’t changed, any undocumented candidate without work authorization would end up in a limbo position, and not be any better off than last year, he said.
“Another option is to fundamentally change these positions,” he said.
According to Hayden, the AS Board has the option of changing their positions in to volunteer positions which would open up the option of compensation through scholarships or other means. The potential issue being that it might make it more difficult for students who rely on the salary to be able to serve on the AS board.
“Until we can come up with a new model, they’re just jobs” he said.
Some campuses have their student governments structured differently. The Western Front reported last summer that a California university had been able to compensate an undocumented student in a similar position through scholarships.
Hayden said they have been reaching out behind the scenes to see what other colleges in the state are doing, including Washington State University, which had been falsely rumored to be paying an undocumented student without DACA, and hadn’t been able to find a solution. He wants to look at what colleges in California have been doing, but would also need to look at differences in state law.
In the meantime, he said work is being done to edit the AS personnel code, formerly the employment code, as the AS restructures and opens up positions on the student senate, to better outline which roles count as employment and which don’t.
“We’re trying to look at as many new models as possible,” he said.
While Hayden said he doesn’t want to say there’s no responsibility at an institutional level, the main obstacle is federal laws.
“If students want to see change, which is great, it’s applying that energy at the right level,” he said.
Matey has a different perspective. She says there has to be a way to compensate undocumented students.
“At this point, I don’t think we should be having the discussion of what is legal or not, I think we should be having the discussion of what is right and what is wrong,” she said. “And it would be really nice to see Western put their foot down and say ‘We’re gonna do what we have to do to protect and help our students and not work against them,’ because that’s what’s happening.”
The AS Board meets tomorrow at 3 p.m in Viking Union 567. The election code is the first item on the agenda after public comments.
Updated to reflect VP Yanzon’s correct pronouns.
This post will be updated.