Articles by The FAMUan state that Washington urged the FAMU
Student Senate to impeach two Student Government Association (SGA) presidents
in the past.
Back in 2007, FAMUan reporter Latasha Edwards wrote that “Washington
told the senate he wanted to impeach Student Body President Phillip Agnew.”
“We need to impeach Philip Agnew for the basis on not doing
his job, not informing us on what's going on with the Board of Trustees and
administrators, violating state laws, purchasing contracts, and allowing our
administration to spend out of control as they have,” Washington was quoted as
saying in the article.
Agnew said “the accusations are unfounded and ridiculous.”
He added that Washington was of “no relevance in terms of impeachment.”
Washington went on to become a cast member in the BET
reality TV series “College Hill” in 2009. A two part-episode called “Ribgate”
featured a dispute between him and Kathryn “Kay” Barlow over a plate of ribs. The
two got into a cursing match (which was one of many that Washington had on the
show).
That wasn’t the end of Washington being at the center of
controversy. A 2015 article by FAMUan reporter TyLisa C. Johnson stated that
Washington worked to convince the Student Senate to bring impeachment charges
against Student Body President Tonnette Graham. Johnson wrote:
"Monday at the student senate meeting, a speaker, in lobbying form, Kyle Washington, charged the senate to impeach Graham.'He [Kyle Washington] charged the senate to impeach Madame Graham and the senate responded with a motion to forward to impeachment,' said Pernell Mitchell II, Judicial and Rules committee chairman."
Graham succeeded in defending herself against the charges
and stayed in office.
Pernell Mitchell became the runningmate of SGA presidential
candidate Victor Chrispin during the 2016 FAMU SGA elections. They faced off
against a ticket headed by Graham’s vice-president, Justin Bruno. Bruno said
that Washington was the campaign manager for the Chrispin/Mitchell ticket.
Agnew and Graham both gave President Elmira Mangum their
strong support when she was hired in 2014. But Washington is currently at odds with Agnew and Graham’s
public efforts to hold top FAMU officials responsible for what they’ve done to
the university.
On June 9, 2016, Agnew announced that he didn’t think
the FAMU Board of Trustees (BOT) should renew Mangum’s contract, which is set
to expire in 2017. His statement came more than a year after Mangum gave her
backing to a move that brought FAMU’s budget control at the FAMU-FSU College of
Engineering to an end. Back when Agnew was the FAMU student body president in
2006-2007, he fought hard to keep that budget control at FAMU. Mangum’s claim
that FAMU didn’t previously control the budget placed her in conflict with
FAMUans like Agnew who know that isn’t true.
Tensions rose between Mangum and Graham when the student
body president refused to be a yes-woman for the administration. Graham
supported a “no confidence” vote in former Athletic Director Kellen Winslow, Sr.,
gave Mangum average marks on her 2015 evaluation, and voted against awarding a
bonus to Mangum.
At her last meeting as a member of the Florida Board of
Governors, Graham also voted to replace FAMU Board of Trustees Chairman Cleve Warren, who was Mangum’s biggest supporter on the board.
Graham’s former vice-president, Justin Bruno, won the
student body presidential election in 2016. He is now battling the Mangum
administration in court due to what he said is the president’s decision to go
along with an effort “to manipulate the election on behalf of the (FAMU)
administration and other administrators.”
“She has a better sense of security about [Chrispin's] assistance on
the board of trustees than she has about mine, because I don’t have a personal relationship
with her, I have a professional relationship with her,” Bruno said.