Green Party of Pennsylvania
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Monday, May 4, 2020
CONTACT:
Hawkins Wins PA Presidential Caucus
The Green Party of Pennsylvania (GPPA, www.gpofpa.org) held its Presidential Caucus during April 2020. Registered Greens from 27 PA counties voted in the caucus, and their votes will send delegates to the Green Party of the United States (GPUS, www.gp.org) Virtual National Convention during July. The PA caucus was won by candidate Howie Hawkins, with 53 percent of the vote.
Hawkins responded, “I thank Pennsylvania Greens for their support. Every state is a battleground state for the Green Party, and perhaps no more so than in PA where Greens have to fight the Democrats as well as Republicans on fracking, pipelines, affordable housing, and military bloat, wars, and coups. Now we have to fight them for ballot access when coronavirus social distancing makes street petitioning unreasonable. My campaign will do all it can to help the GPPA get on the ballot for November 4.”
Hawkins had run a solid campaign, having name recognition within the Green Party from his previous campaigns for Governor of New York and from his authorship of the first Green New Deal in 2008. Hawkins had already won the nomination for president from the Socialist Party of the USA and the Peace and Freedom Party.
At the time of the GPPA Presidential Caucus, there were three candidates who had met the GPUS basic requirements for nomination: Howie Hawkins, www.howiehawkins.us; Dario Hunter, www.dariohunter.com; and David Rolde, www.davidrolde2020.org. The ballot was also open for write-in candidates. In PA, candidate Dario Hunter came in second with 41 percent of the vote.
GPPA had planned to hold in-person county caucuses around the state as it had done in previous presidential elections . . . until the Covid-19 pandemonium. Beth Scroggin, GPPA secretary and chair of Chester County Green Party, said, "I am extraordinarily grateful to my fellow Steering Committee members for working together to organize a safe, effective way of holding our Presidential Caucus while social distancing, and to all the Green Party voters for participating in it."
Each state chapter of the Green Party elects delegates to the GPUS National Convention in accord with their state’s regulations. The GPUS allots delegate status to state chapters corresponding with the number of registered Greens in each state. There will be 402 delegates to the Green Party Presidential Convention, and a candidate will need at least 202 votes to win the Green Party nomination for president on the first ballot. At the convention, GPPA will have 11 delegates, and six will vote for Hawkins while five vote for Hunter.
With the victory in PA, Howie Hawkins now has a sizable lead, having won 14 of the 15 Green Party presidential primaries/caucuses. At the present time, Hawkins has 98 delegates going into the GPUS Presidential Convention, versus Hunter’s 39 delegates. Another 23 delegates are held by three other candidates for president.
Alex Noyle, a Green Party member from Montgomery County said, “I was so excited to vote in an election that used proportional representation. It shows that Green Party ideas about electoral reform are practical and simple to implement.” Similarly, Brian Ullom, a Green Party member from Perry County said, “I felt the online voting was well done. It was simple and easy to do, and I very much hope this is the procedure moving forward.”
The Green Party of PA (GPPA, https://www.gpofpa.org/) is an independent political party that stands in opposition to the two corporate parties. For further information about GPPA, please visit www.gpofpa.org or email [email protected]. Please follow GPPA on social media: Facebook and Twitter.
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