Coronavirus 2020 — Green Party National and State Responses


"COVID-19 has exposed how poorly prepared the U.S. healthcare system is to handle an epidemic,” said Green Party National Co-Chair Margaret Flowers, who also serves on the Board of Advisors to Physicians for a National Health Program. “We've missed the window for containing the virus through screening, testing and monitoring infected people and their contacts — as they did in China, South Korea and other countries. And so we can expect millions of cases.” Flowers also warned that “getting ill in the United States carries the extra burden of potential financial ruin. We need to move to a National Improved Medicare for All health system and paid medical leave as rapidly as possible."

The Green Party stands for Medicare for AllGreen Party platform plank on Health Care


Lawsuit: Ease requirements for 3rd-parties in Georgia amid coronavirus

In a time of "social distancing" and the coronavirus, third-party candidates shouldn't have to go door-to-door collecting over 20,000 signatures to get on the ballot in Georgia, according to a federal lawsuit filed Thursday.

The lawsuit by Libertarian Party and Green Party nominees for the U.S. House of Representatives asked a judge to reduce the signature requirement to account for days lost because of social distancing guidelines by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.


Coronavirus may keep 3rd-party presidential candidates off the ballot

Third-party candidates may be off the ballot this November unless petitioning requirements are relaxed, Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins told Yahoo News on Wednesday.

Hawkins said on the Yahoo News podcast “Skullduggery” that the Green Party may be unable to get on the ballot in as many as 30 states — including Illinois, Ohio, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania — due to state laws requiring third parties to collect thousands of signatures on ballots to qualify. Hawkins said it will be impossible to meet these requirements in light of White House guidelines urging citizens to stay at home and avoid social gatherings.


Pennsylvania Greens organize for 50th anniversary of Earth Day

PHILADELPHIA – "Earth Day, April 22, is important to members of the Green Party of Pennsylvania (GPPA)," said Chris Robinson, leader of GPPA's communication team. "In past years, GPPA has held big events for Earth Day. I remember when we organized with our movement friends to hold Earth Day 2013 demonstrations at every regional office of the PA Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) because they were not protecting the environment from the fossil fuel industry."


Don't Let COVID-19 Knock Grassroots Candidates Off The Ballot


It's time to waive ballot petitioning for ballot access

  • Virginia Ballot Access Petitioning Requirements and COVID-19

The Green Party of Virginia sent the following statement today to the government of Virginia requesting that they waive the petitioning requirement for ballot access in light of the present pandemic.


Listen, Biden! COVID-19 and Medicare for All

On the topic of the COVID-19 pandemic in Sunday's Biden-Sanders debate, Joe Biden said, "…you have a single-payer system in Italy — it doesn't work there. It has nothing to do with Medicare for All. That would not solve the problem at all."

Medicare for All has everything to do with fighting the COVID-19 pandemic. Joe Biden has no idea what he is talking about. He only knows his anti-socialist dogma.


Response to the coronavirus pandemic

  • Strength Through Equality

TREATING AMERICA'S VIRAL INFECTION OF INJUSTICE.

The unfolding epidemic of COVID-19 (Coronavirus) infections has laid bare the weaknesses in this country's healthcare infrastructure as well as the massive inequalities and economic weaknesses of our country's abusive system.


North Carolina Green Party response to COVID-19 and Its effects

PITTSBORO, NC – The outbreak of the specific coronavirus strain now working its way through the US has exposed many weaknesses in the US healthcare system, and in the way the US treats its working class and poor. As the Democratic and Republican parties argue over helping the 1% versus the rest of the country, the North Carolina Green Party recommends that both federal and state governments undertake the following actions to ensure that working class families and the poor, including the homeless, have a chance to emerge unscathed, both physically and financially, from the impact of COVID-19.


Coronavirus restrictions create problems for independent and third-party candidates seeking a place on the fall ballot

Photo Credit: Rich Whitney, state Green Party co-chair, greets people on a sidewalk in Chicago in 2010 when he was a candidate for governor.(Jos M. Osorio / Chicago Tribune)

Tuesday marked the first day for independent and third-party contenders to start seeking voter petition signatures to make the November ballot, but their already difficult task has been made even tougher due to restrictions brought on by the coronavirus pandemic.

Even without any public health concerns, independent and third-party candidates had a tougher job to get on the ballot since they are required to get several times the signatures Republicans and Democrats need to qualify for their primary ballots.


‘Virus or no virus, we can’t lose our voice’

  • Cheri Honkala on battling back in frontline communities

Cheri Honkala has been organizing in the Kensington neighborhood of Philadelphia, one of the US’s most devastated, post-industrial communities, for over 30 years. As of the 2010 census, Kensington was 38.9 percent Hispanic of any race, 37.4 percent non-Hispanic white, 14.8 percent non-Hispanic Black, 6.2 percent Asian, and 2.7 percent all other. And it’s beginning to be threatened by gentrification.