Selecting a selectable using script doesn't seem to work anymore?

Hello everyone,

I'm trying to write a system that automatically selects a "selectable" variable after a menu is instantiated. This way there's always a button selected at the beginning.

Here's my function that selects UI Elements:

 public void SelectElement(Selectable input)
 {
       Debug.Log("Selecting element: " + input.gameObject.name);
       input.Select();
       EventSystem.current.SetSelectedGameObject(input.gameObject);
 }

And Here's where I call it:

 if (CurrentUI.FirstSelectedObject)
  {
      //TODO selecting object should be here
      Debug.Log("Selecting first object");
      SelectElement(CurrentUI.FirstSelectedObject);
 }

And nothing seems to work. Even though both Debugging Messages print correctly and I checked all of the following:

1. I checked if there are any error or warning messages, and nothing prints.

2. I checked that CurrentUI and FirstSelectedObject are indeed the button I want to select.

3. I tried calling this function one time at in Start(), and one time in Update(), and one time in both.

4. I tried using only input.select(), and I tried using only EventSystem.SetSelected

5. I have checked that there's an event system that works normally. In fact navigation works perfectly once I click on a button using a mouse instead of the script.

This is bothering me because I have used this code before and It worked with that same system. Is this a bug? or did I forget something?

Update:

I also noticed something interesting. When I click on the event system it displays the following on the top: "Selected:Button (UnityEngine.GameObject)"

So it clearly selects it, but the selected color doesn't display, and I can't click submit to press it (even though I normally can when I select manually and press submit after that). OnSelect also doesn't get called.