By Molly Dunn
Reporter
Houston junior Zach Rogers defeated Houston junior Ben Aguinaga for student body president and Falls City junior Michael Lyssy defeated Houston sophomore Brian Kim for internal vice president in a runoff election Tuesday.
Rogers won with 52.87 percent of the 1,880 votes cast for president.
“It was a great race; 52 to 48 percent is about as close as it gets,” Rogers said.
“I’m really proud of Zach,” Aguinaga said. “Zach did a fantastic job. [He’s a] great individual and I’m really happy for him. I think he’ll be a wonderful man with outstanding character to run the student body.”
Aguinaga said he was also impressed by the number of votes cast by students and how close the runoff election was.
“It was a great race, honestly. It was something that surpassed a lot of our expectations as far as runoffs go,” Aguinaga said.
Rogers was thankful and appreciative to everyone who cast a vote in the election this year.
“I’m very excited and looking forward to this next year as student body president,” Rogers said. “I hope that the Lord will guide my thoughts and my actions and that we will as student government be a transparent organization to represent students.”
With 1,828 votes cast for internal vice president, Lyssy received 60.61 percent of the votes over Kim.
Both internal vice presidential candidates said they were happy for the election race to conclude, but said they enjoyed campaigning.
“Running for this office has been a pleasure,” Kim said. “I had so much fun just getting to meet new people and I’m just really blessed that God has given me the strength to finish even with the runoff, so I’m just really thankful.”
After being in a runoff for the second consecutive year, Lyssy said he was relieved and thrilled to hear the results.
“I’m looking forward to working next year and starting off with Senate,” Lyssy said. “I think we’ll be really effective this year especially having some experienced leadership on board.”
Lyssy said he will begin working with Senate after Easter break.
“I’m looking forward to working with the new senators and the new officers and advocating for student body,” Lyssy said.
Rogers and Lyssy join Corpus Christi junior Angela Gray, the recently elected external vice president, in student government for the 2011-2012 academic year.