Updated at 1:53 a.m. CST

Members of the Iowa Student Public Interest Research Group and its supporters could only stand by and watch Wednesday as the Government of the Student Body once more diminished its chances at becoming a fully functioning chapter.

Debate at the GSB senate meeting ran to its full length for the second time this semester on ISPIRG’s merits and drawbacks, but senators ultimately failed by one vote to override President Sophia Magill’s veto of a bill that made the organization into a student-funded office of GSB.

The group was zero-funded by a senate vote Nov. 17. Without the funds for a campus organizer — which the group needs in order to be an official chapter — ISPIRG can no longer run PIRG campaigns or use the group’s name.

Student-funded office status would have increased the group’s chances at receiving GSB funds for salaries.

Vice President Will Rock gave his support for the bill during debate. He said it was merely a procedural change and that its passage would guarantee no money for a campus organizer.

“If we would want to consider salary funding for ISPIRG, this has to pass in order to even have this debate,” he said.

Jason Carroll, vice chairman of the finance committee, said ISPIRG is still able to apply for a criteria exception for salaries during regular allocations in the spring.

Off-campus government senator Ben Albright said he was in support of Magill’s veto because he felt many of her reasons for it were valid.

“I don’t know why they need to put on this pedestal as a new organization,” he said. “She wouldn’t be willing to take the storm for this if she didn’t feel it was right.”

Much of the debate centered on whether the senators were truly representing their constituencies when they were voting on these bills. Before debate on the bill began, Magill said, she had only heard support for her actions.

“I’ve been talking to presidents of constituency councils, and most of them haven’t even heard of PIRG,” she said. “They didn’t feel PIRG would bring them the same kind of benefits as other student-funded offices do.”

But off-campus government Senator Jacob Larson had a different opinion.

“We can have a match all day about what people you talked to and what they said,” he said. “President Magill says everyone she talked to supported her decision, but everyone I talked to disagreed with her.”

A bill regarding the institution of articles of cooperation between GSB and ISPIRG also failed to pass at the meeting.