Featured photo by Hannah Carley
Story by Hannah Carley and Alyssa Williams
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Editor’s Note: This story includes vulgar language.
Voters did not elect Benjamin Payson as Student Government Association president after controversial social media posts resurfaced during the SGA spring debate late last month.
On Feb. 27, SGA hosted a debate for the spring 2024 Student Government President, Vice President and Senator elections. During the presidential debate, Michai Mosby and Payson faced off. After opening the floor for questions, Latina student Mariana Bellini asked Payson about past political beliefs.
“How would you address and manage situations involving racist and/or hatred of religion in comments made on social media by students that hold leadership positions ensuring transparency and accountability?” Bellini asked.
Payson’s response was not what she hoped for, she said.
“There are issues with learning to be yourself and being independent,” Payson said. He continued, “I will say I know why people are bringing this up. I will admit that I am a different person than when I first entered college. People change and people grow. What happened after that incident is that I grew and I learned from it. You have to be able to have an open mind as a leader, but you also have to be able to learn and admit when you are wrong.”
In finishing his response, Payson said, “… I was held responsible for certain actions that have been already cleared, if you don’t know what they are, it’s been dealt with. It was a misunderstanding, but what I will say is that we hold each other accountable and we learn from it. If you can’t learn from it, you get out of leadership positions.”
Payson was referring to a time he faced potential impeachment in 2022 because of racist and insensitive comments made in a Discord server for the MTSU class of 2026. The below screenshots were confirmed by Jorge Avila, who was a member of Freshman Council at the time and in the Discord.
Bellini also confirmed the screenshots, as she was a part of SGA Freshman Council in 2022.
“… Ben Payson decided to open a Discord server where he tried to unify the MTSU class of 2026 in one single space,” Bellini told Sidelines. “He made sure to add ‘Freshman Council’ next to his name ‘Life (Ben)’ where he made several controversial and problematic comments.”
The debate continued after the event and spilled onto social media.
Bellini posted a video about the debate on her Instagram and Tiktok. She repeated her question in the video and posted some clips of his answer.
In the video, Bellini misquoted the audio where Payson is heard saying, “I will say I know why people are bringing this up,” to imply that he said, “I know white people are f***** up.”
The full debate can be found on Facebook, where Bellini asked the question at 50:06. At the timestamp 51:05, the audio cuts out. However, the Sidelines recording of the SGA debate reveals that he did not mention white people or curse during the speech between timestamps of 50:06 or 51:29.
The embedded recording, obtained by Sidelines, is only a segment of the debate, including Bellini’s question and Payson’s answer.
Since then, Bellini took down her original video and replaced it with the correct quote and captions.
During her reaction video, Bellini said that while Payson talked about personal growth, she expected an answer to her question.
“Thanks for the opportunity to respond,” Payson commented under the video. “Don’t [re]member cursing last night, everything was a blur from the stress. Keep an eye on me as I show my true self in the upcoming year.”
However, this wasn’t his first comment left under the video. Bellini posted an Instagram story with a screenshot of his current and deleted comments.
Payson’s Instagram comments appear under the handle @mtsu_ben4pres, which he recently renamed @thatmtsuadvocate.
Payson posted a response to Bellini’s video on his Instagram. His statement read that comments which include racism and hatred are wrong and leaders need to be held accountable.
In a separate statement to Sidelines, Payson apologized but declined to discuss the debate.
“… No matter the result of the election I plan to continue to work towards fulfilling my election goals. The work that I have and continue to do with SGA gives my life significance and purpose and I will never stop my efforts to make [MTSU] a better place [than] when I started,” Payson said to Sidelines.
Bellini thanked him for his Instagram response in a comment and made a second part to her video. This video was also re-posted to include the correct quote and captions from the SGA debate.
“I cannot explain enough how mad I felt when [Payson] mentioned ‘I would move to impeach said individual if comments either made in the future or additional comments made in the past came to light,’” Bellini said in her interview with Sidelines. “Double standards … I was frustrated. Because I do not forget what he did back in 2022.”
In the second video posted to Bellini’s social pages, she revealed that Payson asked her to let everyone know to keep an eye on him so he could show his true colors and asked her to make the second video sooner rather than later.
“I never asked him to confess, yet he did,” Bellini said in her interview with Sidelines. “And then he was telling me to do something about it because it was ruining his reputation more than it should.”
Correction, Mar. 1, 2024: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that Bellini edited the clip of Payson contained within her first Instagram video. It has even revised to instead read, “In the video, Bellini misquoted the audio where Payson is heard saying, ‘I will say I know why people are bringing this up,’ to imply that he said, ‘I know white people are f***** up.’
The full debate can be found on Facebook, where Bellini asked the question at 50:06. At the timestamp 51:05, the audio cuts out. However, the Sidelines recording of the SGA debate reveals that he did not mention white people or curse during the speech between timestamps of 50:06 or 51:29.
The embedded recording, obtained by Sidelines, is only a segment of the debate, including Bellini’s question and Payson’s answer.”
Correction, Mar. 3, 2024: An earlier version of this story included links to the original videos posted by Mariana Bellini confronting Ben Payson on social media. Bellini has since then taken down the original videos to replace them with versions that correctly quote Payson’s response at the SGA debate. The story has even revised to instead read, “Since then, Bellini took down her original video and replaced it with the correct quote and captions” and “This video was also re-posted to include the correct quote and captions from the SGA debate.”
Hannah Carley is a contributing writer for MTSU Sidelines.
Alyssa Williams is the News Editor for MTSU Sidelines.
To contact News Editor Alyssa Williams and Assistant News Editor Zoe Naylor, email newseditor@mtsusidelines.com.
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