The Undergraduate Senate (UGS) voted to expel Senator Carmen Kang ’26 from the UGS, alleging she sought to “unconstitutionally suspend the selection of Undergraduate Senate officers” following the ASSU election earlier this year.
During their first meeting of the academic year on Wednesday, the Senate voted unanimously to pass the expulsion bill, with eight senators approving the bill and six — including Kang — abstaining.
The expulsion triggered the ASSU to organize a special election to fill Kang’s now-vacant seat. No timeline has been set for when the election will take place.
The bill, introduced during spring quarter by Senator Mandla Msipa ’26, was a five-page document calling for Kang’s expulsion from the Senate for an alleged attempt to “create a constitutional crisis” and “undermine confidence in the elections.”
Following the certification of ASSU election results in the spring, Kang filed a petition against 10 students — including six undergraduate senators, the members of the ASSU elections commission and the student sponsor for the Statement of Divestment — accusing them of election fraud, collusion and harassment.
“My vision was, if there were actual violations, that it would be right to move it off to the Constitutional Council to review it,” Kang said at Wednesday’s meeting to explain her petition.
She also informed new senators she would lead the next ASSU meeting in the place of co-chairs Ivy Chen ’26 and Gordon Allen ’26, who were among the senators named in the petition, according to an email obtained by The Daily. Her email directive was overridden by Chen and Allen.
Kang did not respond to The Daily’s request for comment. Previously, Kang expressed concerns to The Daily about reporter bias toward other senators.
The spring petition saw three responses from plaintiffs, four amicus briefs and one mass email to the entire undergraduate student population. Kang ultimately withdrew her petition “due to significant health issues” before the ASSU’s Constitutional Council could vote on the matter.
In the spring, Kang expressed concerns over her mental health and safety on campus, citing harassment on the anonymous social media platform Fizz. Kang also said her family received several threatening and anonymous phone calls during her senate campaign. During Wednesday’s meeting, Senator Noah Maltzman ’25 asked Kang whether she would feel safe on campus regardless of the outcome of the vote, to which she paused and responded affirmatively.
Some senators questioned Msipa’s bill. Jared Hammerstrom ’27 asked if holding a special election to replace Kang, an experienced UGS senator, would be best for the student body.
“I felt like it was important that we as a Senate take responsibility for what happened last spring. It brought a lot of attention to us, and not in a good way,” Msipa said.
“We had a really good friendship way before all of this,” said Allen, one of the undergraduate senators named in Kang’s initial complaint. “It’s kind of sad to see how student government came in between all of that and how we got to this point.”
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