2020 Letter on Georgia Party’s Ballot Access Strategy —

as updated following the nominations made by the Bonaire Convention, February 22d, 2020 of the Georgia slate for Presidential Electors.  

In January, the window opened for the collection of ballot access signatures for our non-statewide candidates, and for Presidential candidates seeking to benefit from the March 17th 2016 Order of Judge Story providing as an interim remedy an opportunity to gain access to Georgia’s ballot by collecting 7,500 signatures on an OCGA 21-2-170 et seq petition. 

Until Georgia Greens elect and instruct our Delegation to the Quadrennial Presidential Nominating Convention, scheduled this year for the weekend of July 10th through 12th in Detroit Michigan, we of course are urging Georgia Greens to work for their candidates of choice.  After our second 2020 state convention (in May or June) and the July Convention in Detroit, we hope that Greens will unite around our nominee. 

Not all candidates have demonstrated the same level of commitment to our Party’s nominating process.  You are of course free to study the Green Party filings at the FEC yourself, to review the filings with our national Party’s Presidential Campaign Support Committee, to follow the early primaries of the ballot-qualified Green Parties in other states and the websites and social media postings of any of the dozen or more candidates who have announced their candidacy for our Party’s Presidential nomination.  And party officers are available to advise you on how to effectively work for ballot access for any such candidate.  Still, the Georgia Green Party is limiting invitations to its candidate forums to those candidates who have achieved recognition of the national Party’s Presidential Campaign Support Committee, as others have failed to show a minimum level of organization required for a serious bid for our Party’s nomination, or a campaign for the votes of the American electorate.  

Pursuant to a resolution of the state committee adopted this past Fall, we are publishing here a nominating petition for use by supporters of the candidates who are seeking the nomination of the Green Party of the United States.  Only signatures of registered voters in Georgia will be validated and counted. 

Nomination_Petition_for_Presidential_Electors_gagp-2020  — 7,500 valid signatures required 

In addition, we make available here petitions for additional candidates who have filed a ‘Notice of Intent’ to seek our state party’s nomination for partisan elected offices, at our upcoming February 22nd, Bonaire Georgia Nominating Convention.  Only signatures of registered voters collected from residents of the districts of these local candidates will be validated and counted. 

Nomination_Petition_Form_Political-Body_State1_jimmy_cooper  — 20,719 valid signatures required

Please get your petitions at the links above, make sure you complete the caption on each petition, that you print them front-and-back on white legal size paper, and get out there.  For those who have not done this before, or who might need a refresher course, start by reading the circulator’s affidavit on the back of the petition and please contact the campaigns or party officers for a quick training by phone.  No signatures will be validated, unless the circulator’s affidavit on the back has been signed and notarized.  Perjury is a felony in Georgia.  It is important that you read and understand the affidavit before you start collecting signatures.  Please call if you have any questions.  Watch for an upcoming video on how to effectively collect validatable signatures. We cannot do this without your support. 

— Hugh Esco, Secretary
Georgia Green Party
912-571-1833

2019 Letter on Georgia Party’s Ballot Access Strategy —

Our primary task this year is to do the work so that the Green Imperative we offer is on the ballot as an option for Georgia voters in 2020. The corporate parties are staging their political theatre in all media channels. But we know that whoever wins those contests, that the best we could hope for is half-hearted noise about the crisis we face (catastrophic climate change, imperialism, a poisoned food supply, science, regulatory and legislative bodies corrupted by corporate control), over action to advance the eco-cidal policies of business as usual. The purpose of the blue team’s sheepdog strategy is to distract Green minded voters from building independent political power until it is too late to put a Plan B on the ballot, leaving the voters without a choice.

Last I looked, fourteen candidates had identified themselves to the FEC as intent on seeking our 2020 presidential nomination. Whether we have a ballot line to offer Georgia voters an opportunity to vote for our eventual nominee is now up to us.

Only two things can get that job done: (1) our carrying the petitions and collecting the signatures; and (2) the money to hire still more people to help us do the same.

Those ballot access barriers can melt away, if we win the matching funds race. If only three or five of those candidates seeking our 2020 banner take this campaign seriously enough to qualify EARLY for matching funds, and then invest those funds in a ground campaign to secure the necessary signatures, we can deliver 51 ballot lines to our 2020 nominee.

Even one of those candidates, if the right one, if they are ready to hit the road, could have such an impact by qualifying for matching EARLY; if they continued to work the fundraising as hard until the polls closed as they do to meet the qualifying thresholds early.

Unless the Blue team’s HR-1 language on the matching funds program makes it past McConnel to Trump’s desk, the winning formula is to raise at least $5k in small contributions from each of at least 20 states, before the Conventions adjourn next Summer.

If those candidates serious about seeking our nomination demonstrated it with an early focus on fundraising, and by qualifying in the next month or so for the matching funds program, we’d have a year to double our contributors’ first $250 to fund the work of building this party.

In 2020 it is not enough to defeat Trump, we must also defeat the system which gave rise to his kind.

The window opened for our 2020 petition drive on April 15th. Please get your petition here, make sure you print it front-and-back on white legal size paper, and get out there. For those who have not done this before, or who might need a refresher course, please contact me for a quick training by phone, and watch for an upcoming video on how to effectively collect validatable signatures. We cannot do this without your support.

— Hugh Esco, Secretary
Georgia Green Party
912-571-1833