Rick Perry questions student government election of Texas A&M president

Secretary of Energy Rick Perry is questioning the election of the student body president at his alma mater, citing dirty campaign tricks in an effort to disqualify who he says is the real winner of the contest. 

In an op-ed in the Houston Chronicle, Perry argues that the rightful winner of the Texas A&M student body election was disqualified due to anonymous charges of voter intimidation and for failing to disclose the receipt for glow sticks used in a campaign Facebook video.

“Brooks did not win the election. He finished second by more than 750 votes to one Mr. Robert McIntosh,” Perry wrote, referring to Bobby Brooks, the election runner-up who assumed the post as president.

Brooks is the first openly gay man to serve as the school’s student body president.

“However, McIntosh was disqualified by the [Student Government Association] Election Commission and Judicial Court through a process that — at best — made a mockery of due process and transparency.”

{mosads}McIntosh, the son of a prominent Dallas-area Republican fundraiser, was disqualified over more than a dozen allegations of voter intimidation, and for failing to document money he raised to pay for glow sticks used in a campaign video, according to The Battalion, A&M’s student newspaper. 

Many of the voter intimidation complaints were found to be from people who backed Brooks, Perry said.

Perry in the op-ed said the school’s Board of Regents was never made aware of the accusations of voter intimidation. The former Texas governor claimed the university is “choosing preferred outcomes over equal treatment.”

“What if Brooks had been the candidate disqualified?” Perry wrote. “Would the administration and the student body have allowed the first gay student body president to be voided for using charity glow sticks? Would the student body have allowed a black student body president to be disqualified on anonymous charges of voter intimidation?”

Perry, who attended Texas A&M for his undergraduate degree, called on the university’s election commission to explain its decision to overturn the election results.

“The administration must explain why it stood passive while equal treatment was mocked in the name of diversity, and why officials did not brief the Board of Regents,” he said.