Two of the winning presidential candidates in the University of Colorado’s student government elections won’t take office next month after being disqualified Thursday for violating campaign rules.

Student leaders believe it’s the first time in more than a century that winning candidates have been disqualified from office.

The most serious accusation against the candidates — two of the three students on the winning tri-executive ticket — was that they tried to bribe students to vote for them with cookie cakes and pizzas.

The candidates, Colton Lyons and Marcus Fotenos, are members of the Revolution party and ran on a ticket this spring to become CU’s next student body presidents.

CU students elect three student body presidents — known as tri-executives — from the same ticket each spring semester.

The third member of the Revolution party’s ticket, Madalena DeAndrea, was not disqualified and will take office next month, according to Steve Marcantonio, chief justice of the student government appellate court.

As of Thursday, DeAndrea will be CU’s sole student body president, as the student government constitution allows for any number of executives to hold office.

She takes office after the May 7 commencement ceremony.

“Today marks an inauspicious yet historical day: for the first time in 110 years of institutional memory, candidates seeking office … have had their votes vacated and their seats disqualified,” Marcantonio wrote in a letter about the court’s ruling.

The court upheld enough of the findings of a six-student election infractions panel that met in early April to disqualify Lyons and Fotenos.

The Revolution party also won all four open representative-at-large seats on the student government legislative council. Those seats are not impacted by the appellate court’s ruling.

Three parties competed in the spring election — Revolution, Ignite and Ally.

According to unofficial election results, students cast 2,253 votes for Revolution’s tri-executive ticket, 1,937 votes for Ignite’s ticket, and 816 votes for the Ally ticket.

Voter turnout this semester was 16.7 percent, up from 3.31 percent in the spring of 2015.

Ruling ‘flawed’

The Revolution party retained an attorney to represent its members during the appellate court process and beyond.

They selected Ryan Call, who served for four years as chairman of the Colorado Republican Party, worked for five years as legal counsel to the party and is currently an attorney for Denver-based firm Hale Westfall.

Call said the Revolution party is still deciding on next steps, and described the appellate court’s reasoning as “flawed.”

“We’re reviewing the decision by the appeals court and find some major deficiencies in the reasoning and the standards that were used,” he said. “We’re deeply troubled by the fact that complaints filed by the losing party’s ticket can essentially nullify all the votes cast by students in the election.”

Though Call has both a bachelor’s degree and an MBA from CU’s Boulder campus, he said he was not directly involved with student government as a student. He said his expertise is in election law.

Call said this is the first time he has been commissioned to work on behalf of a student government party. He declined to specify whether he was being paid.

The Revolution party may appeal the decision to Chancellor Phil DiStefano and, if necessary, to the nine-member elected Board of Regents that oversees the university system, Call said.

“We believe the whole process by which these complaints were filed and the charges were prosecuted undermine not only the clear provisions of the election code itself but basic standards of due process and fairness,” Call said.

Later Thursday, CU announced that DiStefano will, in fact, review the student election process that led to the disqualification.

“My goal is to ensure that we have a transparent process that conforms to campus policies and procedures and that all such elections are conducted fairly and openly,” DiStefano said in a statement.

‘A little bit bullied’

Members of the Ignite party, which brought forward some of the complaints against the Revolution party, were surprised when they learned that a private attorney had gotten involved in the process.

“Personally I thought it was a little bit crazy,” said Katey Haas, campaign manager for the Ignite party. “I don’t understand why it needed to escalate quite like that.”

She said her party — which finished second to Revolution’s tri-executive ticket by 316 votes — felt “a little bit bullied and a little bit browbeat” by the attorney.

Haas said she felt hiring a lawyer was a “scare tactic” on the part of the Revolution party.

Legal counsel aside, Haas said she was glad that her party stood up for what its members thought was right.

“We are just happy that the issues that we raised have been addressed,” she said. “The whole thing is really unfortunate and the fact that this had to go this far is really a bummer because all these people are great people who just made some unfortunate decisions. It wasn’t fun to do it, but I’m happy that at least it’s been called out and it’s been addressed and now can move on.”

Though she’s graduating next week, Haas said she’s optimistic that CU Student Government will be stronger than ever.

That sentiment was shared by Joseph Soto, one of the outgoing tri-executives, who is also graduating next week.

Soto said he’s worried that all the good work student leaders have done is being overshadowed by the election results.

CU student leaders control roughly $23 million in student fees and they oversee campus units such as the Recreation Center and University Memorial Center,

“Student leaders have to act higher than the standards set for an average student and I don’t think that everyone did,” Soto said.

Sarah Kuta: 303-473-1106, kutas@dailycamera.com or twitter.com/sarahkuta