Stephen Durham of New York City is one of five candidates for the Peace and Freedom Party Presidential nomination. He is the nominee of the Freedom Socialist Party. His campaign website is here.
Presidential Candidate Stephen Durham
Tag: Freedom Socialist Party
Stephen Durham’s Voter Guide Statement
Each candidate for President is entitled to submit a statement of up to 250 words to the Secretary of State, who publishes them on her website. This is Stephen Durham’s statement (click here for the original).
I am running to offer solutions to the hardships working people face in this economic crisis—solutions that neither Democrats nor Republicans will provide because of their allegiance to the banks and corporations.
My Freedom Socialist Party (FSP) running mate for vice president is Christina López, a leader in fighting Washington state budget cuts. We stand for disarming the war machine and creating full employment with a publicly funded jobs program at union wages; taxing corporate profits to restore desperately needed social services and providing free, multicultural public education for all ages; and establishing elected, authoritative civilian review boards over the police.
We will work for universal, free healthcare, including reproductive services and abortion; nationalizing the banks and energy industry under workers’ control; ending the racist war on drugs; equal rights regardless of race, gender, age, nationality, sexual orientation, immigration status, or physical ability; protecting the environment; and eliminating election laws that discriminate against minor parties. We furthermore see this socialist feminist campaign as a way to help advance a working-class movement for fundamental, lasting change.
My experience through four decades as a radical organizer includes leading FSP branches in Los Angeles and New York City; union activism with co-workers in the restaurant industry; and building ties with socialists in Latin America as an FSP representative.
Endorsers include James Lafferty, Executive Director, Los Angeles National Lawyers Guild; Richard Brown, former Black Panther and victor in the San Francisco 8 case; and Tanya Smith, former president of UPTE-CWA 9119 Local 1.
Stephen Durham Responds to Questions
This documented can also be downloaded as a pdf.
INTRODUCTION
The Freedom Socialist Party (FSP) decided to launch a campaign for president and vice president because the austerity program that is the establishment’s answer to the economic crisis demands a bold anti-capitalist and feminist challenge.
Poverty is growing. Millions are without jobs and healthcare. Young Black men, Latino immigrants, and Arabs and Muslims in the U.S. face official and unofficial harassment and persecution. Women are losing their reproductive rights. As the FSP organizer in New York City, where our headquarters is based in Harlem, on a daily basis I see people just struggling to survive. I am running to offer working-class solutions to the hardships caused by the one percent.
Unprecedented international protest in 2011 reverberated in the U.S. with militant labor protests in Wisconsin and elsewhere and with the Occupy movement. I and my vice presidential running mate, Christina López, believe the time is right to provide an electoral vehicle for working, unemployed, and retired voters to reject business as usual in the White House and Congress. Socialist solutions are desperately needed and people are ready to consider them. They are sick to death with the ongoing capitalist agenda of imperialist war, cutbacks, racist and phony wars on drugs and terror, and the consequent erosion of civil liberties.
Freedom Socialist Party Plans to Sue Over Exclusion of Presidential Candidate
This press release was prepared by the Freedom Socialist Party. The Peace and Freedom Party is a co-sponsor of the press conference and rally on February 29.
NEWS RELEASE
February 27, 2012
Contact: Doug Barnes (206) 985-4621, (206) 326-9771
For release: Immediately
Socialists protest exclusion from California primary
When California Secretary of State Debra Bowen released the names of presidential candidates to be listed on the ballot for the June 5 state primary, she omitted two of four candidates submitted by the Peace and Freedom Party (PFP) electoral coalition: Stephen Durham of the Freedom Socialist Party (FSP) and Peta Lindsay of the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL).
The decision met with immediate objections from all three parties, who demanded that Bowen reverse course and add the names to the list, as she is legally required to do. Thus far she has refused and the Freedom Socialist Party is pursuing a legal challenge.