The Student Assembly Elections Committee is initiating an investigation into Executive Vice President Claire Ting ’25 for allegedly leaking documents to the Cornell Dispatch, a progressive student publication, that may have impacted the fairness of this year’s S.A. elections.
Ting is currently running as a candidate for president of the Student Assembly. In an article published on March 22, The Dispatch included multiple screenshots of text messages from the S.A. Executive Board group chat. Two people with close knowledge of the matter told The Sun that Ting is believed to have leaked the messages.
The messages implicate Vice President of Internal Operations Clyde Lederman ’26 for fielding votes from fraternities. Lederman was at the center of the Dispatch story and stated at Sunday’s Assembly meeting that he has decided to forego running for president due to threats he and his girlfriend have received following the release of the Dispatch article.
“I worked with student journalists as a whistleblower, testifying what I had witnessed IFC and Cornell Dem-affiliated representatives collude in during their involvement with the Student Assembly leading back all the way since Spring 2023,” Ting wrote in a statement to The Sun. “I had felt intimidated due to the IFC/Democrats coalition holding a sizable influence over the Assembly (since before our members were officially sworn in), and I did not feel empowered to speak up about what I had witnessed until I was approached by the Dispatch.”
The investigation will examine whether Ting leaked Student Assembly communications “for personal or political purposes.” The report will center on whether the leaked messages led to the intimidation of candidates who were considering running for the Assembly and whether the leak created an “unfair advantage and undermined the fairness of the Spring 2024 elections.”
These developments come one day after the release of an S.A. Office of Ethics investigation into multiple high-ranking members, including Ting.
Though the investigation into this matter was originally tasked to the Office of Ethics, it was delegated to the Elections Committee as it falls under its purview. Director of Elections Luke Thomas ’27 anticipates that the investigation will be concluded by the end of the week but said he could not comment on specific details regarding the investigation.
Update, April 15, 2:02 p.m.: This article has been updated to include a statement from Claire Ting ’25, who did not originally answer a request for comment.