ASG Academic Director could be impeached

By NNN Staff
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Viewed 2896 times.

Academic Director Muhammad “Mo” Safdari was just sworn in, but he already faces possible impeachment.

"I feel awful for what I did to Bill, I also feel awful for what I did to Mike and I feel awful for what I did to ASG,” he said

The controversy began during campaigning for last week's runoff election. The Weinberg junior e-mailed his supporters accusing the Pulte/Dawson campaign of using extralegal tactics to rally votes. The e-mail circulated campus listservs hours before polls opened.

Former member of the Pulte/Dawson campaign, Will Upton, filed the articles of impeachment saying Safdari hurt the integrity of ASG.

“The fallout from that election, and the giant swing in votes and a lot of the animosity that has come up, it all kind of comes back to him,” Upton said. “It comes back to him and that e-mail.”

Safdari declined to comment on the impeachment, saying he is focused on academic committee issues. In an earlier interview, he said blaming Pulte's loss on his e-mail is a silly and dangerous assumption.

“I wrote that e-mail as Mike's friend, not as Mo Safdari - academic director,” he said.

Now the ASG Rules Committee will decide if there is merit for an impeachment. If a majority says yes, the senate will hold a trial for Safdari next Wednesday. Two-thirds of senators have to vote for impeachment for him to be removed from office.

"It’s pretty rare,” Speaker of the Senate Samir Pendse said. “We have nothing to go off of really to arrange this.”

The rules committee will meet next Tuesday to make a decision. They had planned to rule this week but decided they needed more time to deliberate.

Safdari was sworn in along with the new president, vice president and student life director. If the senate decides to impeach him, a selection commission will appoint a replacement.