• The 2008 Green presidential candidate may come in second in DC, ahead of the Republican, say Statehood Greens

• The candidates: Jared Ball, Jesse Johnson, Cynthia McKinney, Kent Mesplay, Ralph Nader (represented by Howie Hawkins), Kat Swift

WASHINGTON, DC -- The DC Statehood Green Party will have six presidential candidates on the ballot when DC voters go to the polls on February 12 for the primary election.

The six candidates are seeking the nomination of the Green Party in the 2008 race for the White House. The nomination will be decided by about 800 delegates from state parties who will gather at the Green Party's national convention in Chicago, Illinois, July 10-13. The DC Statehood Green Party has qualified for 28 delegates to participate in the nominating process.

THE DC STATEHOOD GREEN PARTY
http://www.dcstatehoodgreen.org

For immediate release:
Wednesday, January 9, 2008

Contact:
Scott McLarty, DC Statehood Green Party Media Coordinator,  [email protected]

The candidates are listed below. Contact information, photographs, video clips, and bios of the candidates can be found on the candidates' own web sites. 

The first Green presidential debate will take place on Sunday, January 13 in San Francisco.

"Since the DC Statehood Green Party has major party status in the District of Columbia, Statehood Green voters will participate in the primary just as Democratic and Republican voters do," said LaVerne Butler, Ward 5 representative on the Statehood Green Party's steering committee.

The Green Party has vowed to achieve 51 ballot lines in 2008 in all the states and the District of Columbia, and has committed party resources for this purpose. Greens currently have ballot access in 21 states, including Washington, DC.

"It's very possible that we'll see the Green nominee come in second on Election Day 2008, ahead of the Republican," said Gail Dixon, at-large member of the DC Statehood Green Party's steering committee and former elected member of the DC School Board. "We're seeing growing enthusiasm for many of our candidates, and District residents know how they've been treated under the Bush Administration for eight years. Many DC voters hold both Democratic and Republican politicians responsible for endorsing the Iraq war and other disastrous Bush policies, and for confirming President Bush's worst appointees. More and more DC voters are hearing the Statehood Green message that a vote in Congress will not give us democracy, and that we need the real thing -- statehood. The Green Party is the only party that supports DC statehood."

In recent elections, DC Statehood Green candidates have collectively won more votes than Republican candidates, even in 2006 when the two parties ran the same number of candidates for partisan office. The Statehood Green Party is now 'DC's Second Party' in terms of electoral clout.

The list of Green presidential hopefuls includes one DC native, two women (one of them African American), one African American man, at least two candidates with Native American ancestry, one of Arab ancestry, a former member of Congress, two former Green presidential candidates, a college professor, a candidate who will turn 35 in June 2008, and a 73-year-old.

The Candidates:

Jared Ball, independent journalist; radio host (WPFW 89.3 FM Pacifica Radio in Washington, DC), hip-hop scholar, assistant professor of communications studies at Morgan State University in Baltimore, Maryland http://www.jaredball.com

Jesse Johnson, 2006 US Senate candidate and 2004 gubernatorial candidate for the Mountain Party in West Virginia (now an affiliate state party of the Green Party of the United States); filmmaker http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMxgYnmdHfg

Cynthia McKinney, former member of the US House of Representatives (Georgia), 1993 to 2003, 2005 to 2007; former member of the Georgia House of Representatives, 1988-1992 http://www.runcynthiarun.org http://www.americanblackout.org/

Kent Mesplay, 2004 candidate for the Green presidential nomination; former president of Turtle Island Institute; environmental engineer, alternative energy activist; California Green organizer http://www.mesplay.org

Ralph Nader, 1996 and 2000 Green candidate for President; 2004 independent candidate for President; consumer advocate (Howie Hawkins of the Green Party of New York State has consented to serve as a 'placeholder' candidate until Mr. Nader announces his intentions for the 2008 election) http://www.draftnader.org

Kat Swift, Texas Green organizer; former Campus Greens leader; activist with Clean Money San Antonio and San Antonio Democracy Now http://www.bexargreens.org/katforprez