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Host Lily Guiney recaps President Samuel L Stanley Jr. and Board of Trustee dispute, the election forecast and a psychology student advocates access to pharmaceutical drugs.
Welcome to The 1909, the podcast that takes an in-depth look at The State News’ biggest stories of the week, while bringing in new perspectives from the reporters who wrote them.
Lily Guiney 0:10
Welcome to The 1909 your home at The State News for everything happening on campus and around Lansing. I'm Lily Guiney. So it's been a while since we last talked, we took last week off for fall break. But now we're back and a lot has happened. So this week, we'll be recapping too many things to listen the intro, so let's get into it.
Lily Guiney 0:27
First of all, and for the last time hopefully, is Sam Stanley still MSU's President? Yes, but not for long. If you listen to our last episode, you'll notice we recorded it the day before President Stanley's resignation when I did this question and said yes, so that was an unfortunate timing situation.
Lily Guiney 0:48
But Stanley announced on October 13, that he's given the Board of Trustees a 90-day notice of resignation, citing a lack of confidence in the board. The search for an interim president began immediately and Stanley said that he's offering his support and full cooperation with the search for his replacement. Upon Stanley's notice of resignation, there was an uproar among student and faculty organizations.
Lily Guiney 1:08
The University Council passed a vote of no confidence in the Board of Trustees and several local political figures spoke out on the resignation. State Representative Julie Brixie, who represents MSU in the state legislature said that the board's actions were quote shocking and deeply disturbing and that she found Stanley to be a stable and transparent leader for the university.
Lily Guiney 1:28
Last week, various faculty and student leaders signed a letter endorsing Provost Teresa K Woodruff for interim president. The State News editorial board also released a statement published last week that it has also lost confidence in the board expressing disappointment at the lack of transparency in the process of events that led Stanley to resign. So an interesting factor to consider in processing all of this information.
Lily Guiney 1:51
There's a lot is that Stanley's resignation is inherently different from those of his immediate predecessors, Lou Anna K. Simon and John Engler both resigned in disgrace, after transparency issues regarding the Larry Nasser case. Simon was even taken to court regarding her involvement, though the charges were ultimately dismissed. Engler was accused by a Nasser survivor of attempting to bribe her out of pursuing a case against the university.
Lily Guiney 2:16
In both of these instances, the public was made aware of the reasons for the president's resignation. And we had a clear timeline of what ultimately happened. In this case, as far as we know, Stanley hasn't done anything egregiously wrong and if he has that information was never made available to the public. What we're dealing with is a disciplinary situation that's been cloudy from the get-go ever since former dean Sanjay Gupta of Broad College failed to report misconduct. Somewhere along the line earlier in the semester, something happened that triggered the board's disapproval and led to the conflict we've seen play out in the press.
Lily Guiney 2:50
The key issue is that throughout the entire saga, there hasn't been any indication as to why this is all happening. We don't know, faculty at the university doesn't know. Governor Gretchen Whitmer doesn't know. And now we're forced to ask if the Board of Trustees knows and if they do, why haven't they explained to the MSU community what's going on? And there's a lot of confusion here, but we here at The State News are committed to bringing you the most comprehensive and timely coverage we can. We'll continue to cover the rest of Stanley's tenure and the forthcoming transition.
Lily Guiney 3:18
Now let's talk about drugs. After student advocacy, Narcan will be available through the MSU pharmacy Narcan or Naloxone is an opioid overdose treatment that can be used in emergencies and has been life saving and millions of overdoses. Psychology senior Jenny Bullis decided to start pushing for Narcan availability on campus after being trained in how to administer it herself. She said that Narcan doesn't have the visibility or awareness on college campuses that it should and that her goal was to make sure that more members of the community knew how to obtain and use a life saving form of medical intervention. And MSU's pharmacy now has a standing order for Narcan and students can get it for free at the pharmacy South Hagadorn location.
Lily Guiney 3:59
The list isn't done fighting for Narcan access though, she said that her next steps will be to getting to get Narcan into dorm buildings so students can have fewer barriers to obtaining it in emergency situations. As overdoses, especially from fentanyl-laced drugs continue to be a problem on college campuses, Narcan access is an important element of keeping students safe. So when this podcast airs, we will be about a week out from election day. It's been a long run, I'm tired, you're tired, everyones tired. But let's take a look at key races around Michigan.
Lily Guiney 4:31
So Gov. Gretchen Whitmer is still pulling above her Republican opponent Tudor Dixon but their gap has narrowed from around 11 points to around six. And it's important to remember that polls tend to tighten up close to the end of the campaign cycle and they shouldn't dictate whether or not you decide to vote. Don't make your voting plan based on a poll -- just a pro tip – never do that.
Lily Guiney 4:51
So Attorney General Dana Nessel continues to have the narrowest lead over her opponent of the three top of ticket candidates at around five points. And Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson is also polling close to eight points ahead of Christina Karamo in their race. Polls open at 7 a.m. on November 8, and these races are all predicted to be nail biters that may not have concrete winners until the next day, depending on how long it takes to tabulate mail in votes.
Lily Guiney 5:17
In other news regarding what's on the ballot, proposal three has stayed at the top of Michiganders minds in the past couple of weeks. In their second debate on October 25, the gubernatorial candidates were asked how they legislate around the abortion rights amendment if it's passed.
Lily Guiney 5:31
Notably, Dixon said that if prop three passes she'll accept the will of the voters and enforce it if she's elected governor. Whitmer fired back that voters shouldn't trust Dixon who denies the results of the 2020 presidential election. Either way, proposal three was last recorded to have a 64% approval rating among voters. So it's looking like whoever's in the governor's office will be working with a state that has reproductive freedom and tried in its constitution.
Lily Guiney 5:55
Let's take a second to run over our ballot proposals. It's important to make sure you know what each one of them means before voting on them and that you don't skip them on your ballot. Proposal one will be a question regarding term limits for state legislators, extending Michigan's legislative term limit from six years to 12 years between either the State House or the Senate. The proposal also contains a provision about campaign finance and is aimed at giving lawmakers more time to govern without being focused on campaigning.
Lily Guiney 6:19
Make sure to give it a read and you can find all of the ballot proposals in full on the Secretary of State's website proposal concerning voting rights. Supporters say it would complete the work started in 2018 when voters passed a ballot measure that now allows us to register to vote up until Election Day here in Michigan.
Lily Guiney 6:35
Among other things, prop two would create a nine day early voting period and require the state to fund absentee ballot tracking and drop boxes. It would also make it illegal to harass, intimidate or threaten voters, both in legal regulation and at polling places.
Lily Guiney 6:50
And as we know, proposal three is the reproductive freedom for all amendment, which would make abortion legal in Michigan, striking the current 1931 band that's on the books. It would guarantee that every Michigan citizen has a quote fundamental right to reproductive freedom, including abortion but also birth control contraception and other family planning methods. It wouldn't prohibit elected officials from regulating abortions in the future after a fetus reaches viability, but it would make it illegal to prohibit abortions that are deemed medically necessary by a doctor to protect the physical or mental health of the mother.
Lily Guiney 7:25
The amendment would also prevent the state from prosecuting or penalizing individuals based on pregnancy outcomes, which means that people who have miscarriages cannot be targeted by abortion bans and other states with strict abortion bans. We've already seen cases where women who have miscarried have been prosecuted by the state under the suspicion of having had an abortion proposal three would prohibit that.
Lily Guiney 7:45
Supporters of prop three say it's necessary to ensure abortion access in the future for all Michiganders. Opponents of the amendment say it's radical and confusing. So while we're talking about ballot proposals, let's take a moment to clear up some misinformation that's been circulating around prop three.
Lily Guiney 8:01
You may have seen ads on TV saying that the proposed amendment would allow minors to get gender reassignment surgeries or sterilization procedures without parental consent. The proposal doesn't actually negate Michigan's current law, which states that minors under 18 need parental consent or a court petition to obtain an abortion. Even if proposal three passes that law would remain in effect unless legislators decide to strike and replace it.
Lily Guiney 8:25
Pro-life groups have also argued that the language of the amendment means that non-medical professionals could legally perform abortions which isn't true. This is also operating under the assumption that proposal three would wipe clean the 41 existing laws regarding abortion that Michigan already has, including regulations on the types of professionals allowed to perform them and the health and safety standards for abortion clinics.
Lily Guiney 8:48
The authors of proposal three have released a statement saying that the amendment would not negate any of Michigan's laws surrounding reproductive healthcare aside from the 1931 abortion ban, and that lawmakers would still be able to decide under prop three if they wanted to keep the existing laws intact. So the gist is that no one is trying to give your underage kid complete medical autonomy and your masseuse or Uber driver won't be allowed to perform an abortion on you.
Lily Guiney 9:12
It's important if you have questions about the proposals to actually read them and look for info from unbiased sources like Ballotpedia, which is what I use to get all this information about the proposals on what they mean and how they might affect you.
Lily Guiney 9:24
So in some brief, MSU news to take us out. ASMSU has elected its next vice president of Governmental Affairs, we welcome Sofia Strach to the position following the resignation of former VP GA Ishaan Modi. Strach is a senior in James Madison College who has previously worked as a state liaison and said that she wants to focus on issues like affordable housing and economic advocacy for students. ASMSU also passed a bill last week to make Election Day a campus-wide holiday in which classes would not be held to give students the opportunity to vote. It passed unanimously and will now be considered by the administration.
Lily Guiney 9:59
And that's it for this episode of The 1909 from The State News. You can find us wherever you get your podcasts airing every Monday and signing off from East Lansing. I'm Lily Guiney.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai