Green Party nominee Jill Stein said Wednesday she and her running mate Ajamu Baraka make up the only presidential ticket that are free of corporate influence and willing to stand up for voters in the 2016 race.
“We’re standing up for everyday people,” Stein said at the outset of the event.
Citing her opposition to money in politics, Stein said that her party stood alone on the national scene totally independent of corporate influence.
“We have the unique ability to actually stand up for what it is that the American people want, what everyday people want,” Stein said.
As they seek to make their liberal platform known to the public, Stein has said she hopes to reignite and build upon the “political revolution” of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.
Stein, a retired medical doctor, environmental activist and musician, made a failed bid for the presidency in 2012, but this time around, she has said things are different.
In the latest CNN Poll of Polls, Stein was at 5% support nationwide, showing she has yet to break out. Part of this may owe to the lack of establishment support and little in the way of mainstream attention she has achieved. Despite her outreach to Sanders’ supporters, Stein has been largely ignored — even after years’ worth of effort — by Sanders himself.
But the mainstream nominees, Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump, have achieved historically poor favorability ratings from voters nationwide. Stein has seized on this point and focused her message on disaffected progressive voters in particular, reserving her sharpest critiques for Clinton.
Hillary Clinton
Stein made clear, as she has her entire campaign, that she believes Clinton is not an acceptable choice for president.
She made the case against Clinton not only on matters of policy, but on trustworthiness.
Stein implied Clinton was so interconnected as to be unprosecutable. With regard to the former secretary of state’s email controversy, Stein called Clinton “too big to jail.”
Compounding her concerns with Clinton’s character and alleged impropriety, Stein hit Clinton’s record on foreign policy.
“I do have serious questions about Hillary’s judgment, her safeguarding of national security information and above all, her trustworthiness in the job where she will have her finger on the button,” Stein said.
Ending the critique with an appeal to voters, Stein summarized: “I have serious concerns about Hillary. That’s why I’m in this race — to provide an alternative.”
Disappointment in Obama
Stein’s running mate has criticized President Barack Obama extensively, and he outlined his disappointment with the president early on.
“You have to basically call it as you see it and be prepared to speak truth to power,” Baraka said. “Barack Obama had an historic opportunity to transform this country.”
Baraka said the nation’s first black president did not live up to his historic opportunity.
“He allowed his commitment to neoliberal policies and a neoliberal worldview to undermine the possibility of greatness,” Baraka said.
Baraka did not demure when confronted with his more strident comments about Obama, like calling him an “Uncle Tom.”
“If we were concerned and serious about how we could displace white power, we had to demystify the policies and the positions of this individual,” Baraka said, referring to his attempt to “shock” people out of faith in Obama’s transformative potential.
He conceded that his language sounded “inflammatory” to some, but said, “I stand by that.”
Foreign Policy
Almost 15 years after September 11, Stein recounting of the US’ “War on Terror” was one of a protracted and brutal failure.
“We have a track record now of fighting terrorism … This track record is not looking so good,” Stein said. “We have killed a million people in Iraq alone.”
After recounting the toll in money and human life the US’ counterterror efforts, Stein said: “What do we have to show for this? Failed states, mass refugee migrations and repeated terrorist threats.”
Certainly the most vocally anti-war candidates of the four top tickets, Stein called for a full rethinking of the United States’ “War on Terror.”
“We are calling for a new kind of offensive, a peace offensive in the Middle East,” Stein said.
The “peace offensive” would include an embargo on weapons sales and a freeze on funding to states that support “jihadi terrorist enterprises,” pointing to Saudi Arabia in particular.
She called for a massive cut in military spending, including the closure of many bases, a shutdown to the F-35 program and not moving forward with the modernization of the US nuclear weapons program.