GPSA's elections chairwoman resigned Sunday.
Michelle Touson e-mailed her resignation to Graduate and Professional Students Association President Joseph Garcia and Council Chairman Christopher Ramirez.
"I appreciated the time that I had serving the UNM students, but I couldn't lose site of what I came to UNM for," she said. "This is more of a distraction for me in completing my degree."
Touson's resignation comes after former Proxy Council Chairwoman Erin McSherry filed a complaint with the GPSA Court of Review alleging Touson obstructed Garcia's recall.
Touson said she resigned because of the conflicts between GPSA council members.
"We're supposed to be the senior academics on this campus after the professors, and these people are arguing like kids," she said. "If you have ever gone to GPSA meeting, it is the most mind-numbingly tedious, I-can-pee-farther-than-you contest. I've been to one, and that was one too many."
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
Ramirez said he will meet with Garcia today to discuss Touson's resignation.
"No election chair has ever had to deal with the amount of work and the amount of hostility that she had to put up with this year," Ramirez said.
She is the third person in two days to resign from GPSA. Chief Justice Josh Allison and Associate Justice Christopher Shank resigned Sunday via e-mail because the "court is fractured beyond repair."
The council has been divided by the decision to recall Garcia. It is an issue that has crippled the council since December, when members presented a recall petition signed by 284 graduate students. The petition stated that Garcia had failed to complete his duties as president of the council.
GPSA's constitution mandates a recall election be held within 20 class days of the petition being presented, but the council voted in December not to have the election.
Garcia said he appointed Touson to the position in September because she was well-qualified for the job.
But some members of the council disagree.
In her complaint, McSherry cited Touson for failure to "hold a recall election as provided for in the GPSA constitution" and for publicly supporting Garcia in a letter Touson issued to the council in November.
Touson told the court McSherry's accusations were "false and without merit" and were "an excuse for some (members of the council) to further stretch out an issue" that had already been decided.
She said she left the decision whether to recall Garcia to the council because there was a discrepancy between the constitution and the elections code.
"Because of the ambiguity of the election code and the constitution, I thought it was only right that the decision on a recall election be made by those that were elected by the students," Touson said.
She said McSherry's complaint was a personal attack because Touson was appointed by Garcia, and the conflict is linked to his recall election.
"Anyone that is associated with Joseph is catching some of that flak," she said. "They are working really hard at discrediting him, but he still manages to rise above. They keep filing these papers, but nobody yet wants to go to mediation. So it is that it has to be personal."
McSherry said the complaint was not a personal attack on Garcia or Touson - it is about following the GPSA constitution.
"The only thing that I'm worried about is that there needs to be an election. Otherwise, we are not following the rules, and there is going to be a total loss of respect for this government," she said.
