Howie Hawkins | |
|---|---|
 Hawkins in 2018 | |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Howard Gresham Hawkins III (1952-12-08)December 8, 1952 (age 72) San Francisco,California, U.S. |
| Political party | Green (2001–present) Socialist (1973–present) |
| Other political affiliations | Greens/Green Party USA (1990s–2019)[a] |
| Education | Dartmouth College |
| Website | Official website |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance |  United States |
| Branch/service |  United States Marine Corps |
| Years of service | 1972–1978 |
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|---|---|---|
Gubernatorial campaigns Political party affiliations Other political affiliations | ||
Howard Gresham Hawkins III[1][2] (born December 8, 1952) is an Americantrade unionist andenvironmental activist. Co-founder of theGreen Party of the United States, Hawkins was the party'spresidential nominee in the2020 presidential election. His ideological platform includes enacting aneco-socialist version of theGreen New Deal—which he first proposed in 2010—and building a viable, independent working-class political and social movement in opposition to the country'stwo major political parties andcapitalism.[3]
Hawkins has played leading roles inanti-war,[4]anti-nuclear,[5] and pro-worker movements since the 1960s. Hawkins is a retiredteamster and construction worker; from 2001 until his retirement in 2017, Hawkins worked the night shift unloading trucks forUPS.[6][7]
Hawkins hasrun for numerous political offices on 25 occasions, all of which resulted in losses.[8] He was theGreen Party of New York's candidate for theU.S. Senate in 2006. In 2010, Hawkins ran as the Green Party's candidate forGovernor of New York, which restored ballot status for the party when it received more than the necessary 50,000 votes. In 2014, Hawkins ran again for the same office and received 5% percent of the vote. Hawkins ran forMayor of Syracuse in 2017 and received roughly 4% of vote. He then ran a third time for Governor ofNew York in 2018, but received less than 2% percent of the vote.
Hawkins received 407,068 votes, or 0.2% of the electorate in the2020 presidential election,[9] receiving nearly a percentage less of the popular vote compared to 2016 Green Party nomineeJill Stein.[10]
Hawkins ran for Governor of New York in2022, but since the Green Party only received 32,832 votes in New York in the 2020 election, a far cry of the 130,000 needed, the party lost ballot access and Hawkins ran as an Independentwrite-in candidate.[11] He failed to win, as the sum of all write-in votes was 9,290, or 0.2%.[12]
Hawkins was born inSan Francisco,California, in 1952, and raised in nearbySan Mateo, California.[13][14][15] He grew up in a diverse neighborhood in the city near theBayshore Freeway, which had seen a large influx of migrants from thesouthern United States, both black and white: Hawkins has credited hissouthern-inflected accent as being a result of this.[16] His father was an attorney who was a football and wrestling student-athlete at theUniversity of Chicago and served in the counter-intelligence unit for theU.S. Army'sManhattan Project duringWorld War II.[13][14] He became politically active at the age of 12, when he saw how the multiracialMississippi Freedom Democratic Party was denied recognition at the1964 Democratic Convention.[15]
After high school, Hawkins attendedDartmouth College in New Hampshire. He was never granted a degree because he did not complete the foreign language requirement. While at Dartmouth, he founded the Dartmouth Radical Union which opposed Dartmouth's investment in corporations that supported, among other causes,apartheid inSouth Africa and theVietnam War. Despite his anti-war activism, he joined the Marine Corps after being drafted in 1972.[17][18] He was never ordered back to active duty after completing boot camp.[5]
That same year Hawkins campaigned forBernie Sanders, then theLiberty Union Party candidate forsenate andgovernor of Vermont.[19][20] In 1973, Hawkins joinedSocialist Party USA, a membership which has continued to the present day.[21] In 1976, Hawkins was one of the co-founders of theClamshell Alliance which was an anti-nuclear power organization aimed at stopping its use inNew England.[19]
In the 1980s Hawkins joined thegreen movement. In 1988, he andMurray Bookchin founded theLeft Green Network "as a radical alternative to U.S. Green liberals", based around the principles ofsocial ecology andlibertarian municipalism.[22] In the early 1990s a press conference was held in Washington, D.C., that featured Charles Betz, Joni Whitmore, Hilda Mason, and Howie Hawkins to announce the formation of theGreens/Green Party USA.[23] Later in December 1999,Mike Feinstein and Hawkins wrote the Plan for a Single National Green Party which was the plan to organize theASGP andGPUSA into a singleGreen Party.[24] Aperennial candidate, Hawkins ran in multiple New YorkSenate andHouse races.[25] In2010 he surpassed the 50,000 vote requirement to stay on the ballot in the gubernatorial election andfour years later he received enough to move the Green Party line to Row D as he had taken one-third more than theWorking Families Party and twice as much as theIndependence Party.[26] However, in2018 he lost 80,000 votes, but retained ballot access and was only lowered one row down to Row E.[27]
In2012 Hawkins was approached over the possibility of running for the Green Party nomination, but declined due to his employment commitments atUPS forcing him to campaign for offices in New York at most and would interfere with a national campaign.[28] Following Hawkins' retirement he was approached again to run by adraft movement with a public letter addressed to him that was signed by former Green vice presidential nomineesCheri Honkala andAjamu Baraka, former Green mayoral candidate andRalph Nader's 2008 running mateMatt Gonzalez, and other prominent Green Party members.[29]
Hawkins was accidentally listed on ballots in Minnesota as the Green Party candidate for vice president, along withJill Stein for president in the2016 general election. AlthoughAjamu Baraka was Stein's running mate on the party's national ticket, Hawkins was inadvertently placed on the Minnesota ballot due to the party using him as a stand-in before the vice-presidential candidate was chosen.[30] With Hawkins listed, the Green Party ticket forPresident of the United States in Minnesota received nearly 37,000 votes statewide, an increase of 0.82% from the party's previous result in2012.
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In 1993, Hawkins favoredanarcho-communism as well aslibertarian municipalism, as the "best way of integrating worker's control and community control in a process of social change that ultimately yields in a marketless, moneyless, stateless cooperative commonwealth".[31] Hawkins was also a member of theIndustrial Workers of the World.[32]
Hawkins disagrees with the "party-within-the-party" approach to theDemocratic Party exercised by organizations such as theDemocratic Socialists of America or by individuals such asBernie Sanders.[33] Instead, he believes that socialists should immediately create an independent left-wing party.[33]
Hawkins became the first politician to include theGreen New Deal in their election platform when he ran for Governor of New York in 2010.[34] Hawkins supports the Green Party's version of the Green New Deal that would serve as a transitional plan to a one hundred percent clean, renewable energy by 2030 utilizing acarbon tax,jobs guarantee, free college,single-payer healthcare and a focus on using public programs.[35][36] He self-describes as aneco-socialist andlibertarian socialist.[37][38]
Hawkins was theGreen Party of New York's candidate for theUnited States Senate in the state of New York. Hawkins received 55,469 votes in the November 2006 election (during which Hillary Clinton was re-elected), for 1.2% of the total votes cast.[39]
In 2008, Hawkins ran for theUnited States House of Representatives inNew York's 25th congressional district on the Green Populist line. Hawkins won 9,483 votes, losing to DemocratDan Maffei by 147,892 votes.[40]
In May 2010, Hawkins was nominated to run forGovernor of New York as the Green Party candidate. His campaign was also supported by theSocialist Party of New York.[41]
On November 2, 2010, Hawkins received nearly 60,000 votes (1.3%), allowing the Green Party of New York to be listed on the ballot for the next four years.[42][43]
In December 2010, Hawkins was named co-chair of the newly recognized Green Party of New York.[44]
Hawkins announced his candidacy for 4th District Common Councilor in Syracuse in September 2011, running as a Green Party candidate.[45][46] His opponent was a Democrat, Khalid Bey. Hawkins received endorsements from the Syracuse Post Standard, UNITE HERE Local 150, and the Greater Syracuse Labor Council.[47][48] Hawkins planned to sponsor resolutions for state tax code reforms to require more from the state's wealthiest, and to share more revenues with cities. He also supported the establishment of a municipal development bank to provide financing for local cooperative businesses and a 0.4% "commuter tax" on the incomes of suburbanites working in the city.[49] Hawkins lost the election to Bey.[50]
On May 20, 2013, Hawkins announced that he would again run for 4th District Common Councilor in Syracuse. His opponent was incumbentDemocrat Khalid Bey.[51] On October 16, 2013, Hawkins published a fiscal position paper with mayoral candidate Kevin Bott focused on a new scaled local income tax, and the role of the state in the fiscal crisis in Syracuse. Bott and Hawkins point out that New York revenue sharing with its biggest cities has decreased from the teens to just about one percent since the 1970s.[52][53] Hawkins lost the election toDemocrat Bey by a vote of 1,471 to 995.[54]
On April 9, 2014, Hawkins announced his second candidacy forGovernor of New York at the LCA Pressroom inAlbany, New York. His campaign positions included a "Green New Deal" platform, a "Clean Money" system for public financing of elections, ending New York's role in the national Common Core standards, and aminimum wage increase to $15 an hour from the then-current $8 an hour in New York.[55] Hawkins' running mate forLt. Governor was New York City educator and union activistBrian Jones.[56] Hawkins and the Green Party received 184,419 votes (4.8% of the vote), which moved theGreen Party up to the fourth line on state ballots for the next four years (surpassing the Working Families and Independence parties).[57]
In 2015, Hawkins ran for Syracuse CityAuditor against incumbent Marty Masterpole. Hawkins noted that Masterpole had filed only two financial audits, and criticized him for auditing city skating rinks and golf courses while the city suffered from high poverty, failing infrastructure and struggling schools.[58] Former District 2 city councilor Pat Hogan suggested to Hawkins that he should run for auditor, stating, "I'm not turning Green ... I am more concerned about the city than the party. The auditor is supposed to be awatchdog on the city budgets and Marty isn't doing any watching. There's a dearth of independence in city government."[59] Hawkins lost the election, winning 35 percent of the vote.[60]
In 2017, Hawkins ran for Mayor of Syracuse as a Green Party candidate to replace outgoing mayor Stephanie Miner. One of his central campaign points was to restore theErie Canal through Downtown Syracuse to help aide in the revitalization of the neighborhood, with the belief that 'Cities that capitalize on their waterways tend to have more vibrant downtowns[61]'. Hawkins won 4.1% of the vote (excluding write-ins) and lost to independent Ben Walsh (54.4%, excluding write-ins),[62] the first independent in the city's history.
On April 12, 2018, Hawkins announced his third run forGovernor of New York on the Green Party line. Hawkins and running mate Jia Lee received 95,716 votes (1.7%).[63]
In2012 Hawkins was approached over the possibility of running for the Green Party nomination, but declined due to his employment commitments atUPS forcing him to campaign for offices in New York at most and would interfere with a national campaign.[64]
However, following Hawkins' retirement he was approached again to run by a draft movement with a public letter addressed to him that was signed by former Green vice presidential nomineesCheri Honkala andAjamu Baraka, former Green mayoral candidate andNader's 2008 running mateMatt Gonzalez, and other prominent Green Party members.[65]
On April 3, 2019, Hawkins announced that he was forming anexploratory committee to prepare for a potential candidacy for the Green Party2020presidential nomination and later Hawkins formally launched his campaign on May 28, 2019, inBrooklyn, New York.[66][67][68]
On August 23, 2019, the Hawkins campaign announced they had met the requisitefederal matching funds forCalifornia andNew York.[69] The campaign must receive $5,000 from residents, with no more than $250 counted for each contribution, in at least 20 states to qualify for the funds. Only his campaign andSteve Bullock's applied for primary season matching funds.[70]
On October 26, 2019, Hawkins won the nomination of the Socialist Party USA in his effort to unite smaller left-wing parties together.[71] In November, Hawkins won the nomination ofSolidarity.[72][73]
On May 5, 2020, Hawkins selectedAngela Walker as his running mate.[74]
On July 11, 2020, Hawkins was chosen as the Green Party's nominee for the 2020 U.S. presidential election. His platform includes theGreen New Deal (funded in part by cuts to military spending),Medicare for All, a federal jobs guarantee, a $20 minimum wage and aguaranteed minimum income.[34]
On November 3, 2020, the results of theelection were declared. Hawkins had received 407,068 votes (0.26%) of the popular vote, and0 electoral votes.[75] This was the third bestshowing a green party member had received, afterJill Stein andRalph Nader. Hawkins conceded the election toJoe Biden.
| Party political offices | ||
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| Preceded by | Green nominee forPresident of the United States 2020 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Socialist nominee forPresident of the United States Endorsed 2020 | Succeeded by |
| International | |
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| National | |
| Other | |
