New chief justice and senators appointed in SGA

Sol Garcia | THE RIDER

In a 6-3 vote, the Student Government Association appointed a Supreme Court chief justice during its virtual meeting last Friday. 

Samantha Lara, a political science junior, said she has had many experiences to prepare her for the chief justice position, such as the First Year Internship, where the previous chief justice and current Senate Chair Yahia Al-Qudah mentored her. 

“My main goal as chief justice would be to help make a difference in the university through our students and our community,” Lara said. “If placed in the chief justice position, I would genuinely want to be available to all university members in order to hear out any issues or new items of business. It is important to try and visualize plans to better or improve our school for current or future generations.”

As chief justice, Lara will review governing documents and make judicial decisions when needed. The role comes with a lifetime position, meaning Lara will remain as chief justice until her graduation.

“I understand that it is important for a chief justice to be able to review, understand and be able to provide clarification on any of the governing documents to all students and other SGA members,” she said. 

After Lara’s introduction and Q&A with senators, Leticia Villarreal, a senator for the College of Health Professions, asked for a debate regarding Lara’s appointment “since this is a really important position,” Villarreal said.  

Senators DesiRae Smith, who worked with Lara during Lara’s internship, and Anacette Cantu, who helped review Lara’s resume and interview as part of the Internal Affairs Committee, spoke in support of Lara’s appointment.

 “I was truly impressed by Miss Lara’s work ethic all last semester,” Smith said. “I truly believe that she is fully capable of this position, no matter if it’s for life, and no matter how hard it is. She’ll be able to take it on.”

Sen. Villarreal spoke against Lara’s appointment. 

“[Lara] mentioned she wanted to help students, but a chief justice position is more like helping the SGA senators when it comes to something positive, negative or good in order to be able to make a certain assertion if there’s any issues in SGA,” Villarreal said. 

The SGA proceeded to vote and confirm Lara’s appointment as chief justice. 

Four new senators, who are all previous First Year Interns, were also appointed: political science junior Angela Cantu, College of Liberal Arts; international business freshman Andrea Leal, senator-at-large for Edinburg; biology junior Megan Solis, senator-at-large for Edinburg; and information systems sophomore Marco Kidder, senator-at-large for Edinburg.

Later in the meeting, members expressed their approval at hosting a virtual event for students to meet the association’s senators later this semester. 

“Meet the Senators would be a super valuable event for UTRGV students and faculty to be able to attend,” Sen. Smith said. “We are the voice of the students, and … the first-year students incoming aren’t completely familiar with SGA, or the senators or who they can reach out to regarding their own college and any [ideas] or constructive criticism or even unconstructive criticism they might have.” 

As a special guest, Angelina Buitron, a UTRGV graduate student recruiter, informed the SGA about the university’s graduate program. 

“Our mission with graduate college is to provide you with quality programs, flexible format and affordable education,” Buitron said. “We have more than 100 different programs out there.” 

Al-Qudah announced senators will begin hosting office hours via appointment only. 

“That means students, if they would like to meet with their senators, they can go ahead and contact SGA, and we’ll set up a meeting,”he said. 

This year, the SGA elections will be held online from 8 a.m. March 22 to 11:59 p.m. March 31. 

“Students will be receiving a ballot to their email with instructions, so that way, they can vote in the upcoming elections,” said Jodie Dominguez, SGA adviser. 

Election winners will be announced April 2. 

The next SGA meeting will be at 6 p.m. via Zoom March 12. 

To contact SGA members, click here.