I’m a Green Party Member Who Won Four Elections. Don’t Throw Away Your Vote on Jill Stein.

An Open Letter to My Fellow Greens:

Why are we running a national candidate once again in a close race between Harris and Trump? It makes no sense.

Yes, I love the platform that Jill Stein is proposing. It’s much closer to what I believe than either major party candidate’s proposals.

But political campaigns are about more than the best fit. It’s about winning. And losing.

Ever since the Greens organized as a national party, we’ve been running national and sometimes state candidates who ALWAYS lose. We’ve become a party of losers. And so our votes take votes away from progressive candidates and help conservative candidates. What kind of political strategy is that?

We claim to be a party that believes in grassroots democracy. But instead of working from the grassroots, we run media campaigns from the top down – invariably losing and helping conservatives get elected.

I’m a Green, and I won all four times I ran as a Green county commissioner on the ballot in Colorado. And in my last term I was able to convince my board to make a formal apology from my county to the Uncompahgre Utes who were forcibly removed to Utah in 1881 – an apology which was accepted, which is only the first step in reconciliation for Colorado’s genocidal policies of the 19th Century. But still, a first step.

Greens can make a difference, but only if they embrace grassroots democracy and build the party from the bottom up.

Don’t throw away your vote on Jill Stein in November. In a close race between a fascist and a Democrat, make your vote count.

Art Goodtimes
Former San Miguel County Commissioner (1996-2016)
Registered with the Green Party of the United States
Facilitator, San Miguel Greens
Former chair of the Public Lands Committee of Colorado Counties, Inc.
CCI Distinguished Service Award (2016)
Former chair of the Gateway Communities Subcommittee of the National Association of
Counties