If you get too caught up in the news coverage of this election it can be easy to forget that there are more than just two candidates running. In fact, there are 1,218 names on the Federal Election Commission’s list of presidential candidates for 2020. Despite the odds stacked against them and despite the full knowledge that they’ll receive almost no media coverage, these brave patriots have thrown their names into the POTUS hat — for good or ill.
And should you find one among them, whose campaign platform resonates with you, who you believe in as a person and a politician, who inspires and invigorates you, then you can (and should) vote for them. Whether or not you think they’ve “got a chance.”
You want choices? We’ve got choices. There’s thousands of different Americans who think they’re fit for the job — you’ve just got to do your own digging to learn about them. Here's a few of our favorites…
Photo courtesy of Google Creative Commons.
Mark Charles
As an ardent social justice campaigner for issues facing Native Americans and people of color, Mark Charles has a much different perspective on social equity in America than most of our presidential candidates do. For several years, he lived on a Native American Navajo reservation with his family, without electricity or running water, preparing food on a camp stove and experiencing first-hand how marginalized America's Native populations are.
Instead of growing bitter, though, Charles decided he wanted to stand up and try and change things. He left the reservation with that intention: to get into politics and help establish a socially equal, more inclusive America for his children's future.
Now he's running for president.
“This is what my campaign is all about,” Charles tells the BBC in an interview. “If we want to be a nation where 'we the people' truly means all the people, we have to do some foundational-level work. We can't just say it and wish it was so: we actually have to go in and change some things that this nation was founded on, such as the racism, the sexism and the explicit white supremacy."
Photo courtesy of Google Creative Commons.
Jade Simmons
A professional concert pianist and the daughter of a civil rights activist, Jade Simmons can is a truly multi-talented and unique candidate for president. She is an Independent, focused on creating equal access to opportunity through economic, educational and criminal justice reform. And she’s going to do it all on the tightest campaign budget in American history.
"Everything from disgruntled Bernie bros to conservative Christian pastors are liking our policy,” she says.
Simmons is also an ordained minister, a motivational speaker, a rapper and a mother. She is an unprecedented candidate for unprecedented times, as she says. Sadly, though, if you like her platform enough to cast your ballot in her name, you’ll probably have to write her in. As an Independent candidate her name will only appear on ballots in Louisiana and Oklahoma.
Photo courtesy of Google Creative Commons.
Brock Pierce
You remember the Mighty Ducks films? Or the 1996 comedy First Kid? If you do, then you’ll probably recognize Brock Pierce.
This former child-actor turned crypto currency billionaire, wants to bring some vision to this country, which he sees as blinded by the two-party system. Dubbed the “hippie king of crypto-currency” by Rolling Stone, this progressive crypto-mogul wants to legalize cannabis, regularly attends Burning Man (where he held a unicorn-themed wedding), and sports both liberal and conservative tendencies.
“I think it's time we take a collective breath and a brave step into the future, because all of these ideologies have something to teach us." He says.
Photo courtesy of Google Creative Commons.
Vermin Supreme
If Rooster were to endorse any one of these alternative candidates, then it would have to be Vermin Supreme. While the guy might look like your typical, Massachusetts nutcase, sporting a bushy white beard, wild blue eyes and his characteristic rubber-boot-hat, Vermin actually has some very down to Earth ideas in his platform. Sort of.
First and foremost, he promises mandatory toothbrushing, “To combat the moral and oral decay of this great nation, President Supreme will sign a declaration of war on plaque, and citizens will be required to submit to regular inspections of their gum-lines.”
No doubt the oral health of this great nation would improve immensely, under a Vermin Supreme presidency.
He also promises to switch our energy sources to totally renewable “zombie power,” will enforce law and order with kangaroo courts, reorganize American economics to be based on an “Absolutely Free Pony Identification Program (AFPIP)” and will establish and institute “funcentration camps across the country, for happiness re-orientation.”
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