PSL Presidential Campaign on the ballot in Arkansas, Colorado, Vermont and New Jersey

The Party for Socialism and Liberation is proud to announce that our 2012 campaign is confirmed as being on the ballot in Arkansas, Colorado, Vermont and New Jersey!

These are just the first four of many states throughout the country in which the PSL's campaign is seeking ballot access. We will bring the campaign’s socialist message to poor and working people in every region of the country.

With just this initial success, millions of workers will have the option of voting for the PSL’s campaign. Instead of voting for one of the two major parties beholden to the interests of the bankers and CEOs, people in these four states can cast a vote for revolution!

These states in particular are badly in need of a socialist alternative. Arkansas suffers under significantly greater poverty – 18 percent according to the government’s outrageously low threshold – than the rest of the country, and the state legislature is considering harsh budget cuts. Colorado was among the first states to be hit hard by the capitalist economic crisis, leading the country in foreclosures in 2006.

Last year, Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin's budget included 83 million dollars in cuts, affecting programs that provide assistance for mental and children's health care. In New Jersey, workers face an unemployment rate that is even higher than the outrageous national average.

Now the working people of Arkansas, Colorado, Vermont and New Jersey can vote against the twin parties responsible for these attacks. This tremendous accomplishment was made possible by the hard work of PSL volunteers. The Lindsay/Osorio PSL presidential campaign is truly a grassroots movement with no paid campaign workers.

Please make an urgently needed donation to help us get on the ballot in states across the country!

In Arkansas, a team of volunteers secured our place on the ballot through a tireless petitioning effort. The minimum requirement in the state is 1,000 valid signatures, but the PSL campaign managed to turn in over 2,000. Students and members of working-class communities were eager to help a people’s campaign challenge the twin parties of the rich.

Our team was able to meet their goal in just five days, focusing on college campuses, shopping centers and public events in downtown Little Rock. Petitioners visited campuses like the University of Arkansas – Little Rock and the University of Central Arkansas. Many working-class people, especially in the African American community, were very receptive to our campaign’s anti-racist message in the wake of the murder of Trayvon Martin, and many were just happy to see the word "socialism."

Lindsay/Osorio supporters carried out a similar effort in Vermont. Focusing their efforts on Burlington, volunteers braved snow and freezing temperatures to collect the 1,000 valid signatures to be placed on the ballot. The workers and students who signed the petition were glad to hear that the two-party system would be challenged by a candidate who will fight against the bankers and CEOs. Because of the overwhelming support Lindsay/Osorio campaign petitioners recieved from the people of Vermont, they were able to collect 2,000 signatures in less than a week.

In New Jersey, 800 valid signatures are required, and the PSL campaign submitted over 1,500.

We would like to thank the many people willing to be electors for our campaign, a critical part of ballot access work. In Arkansas, we are required to have one elector for each of four congressional districts plus two more at-large, while in Colorado we must have nine electors, in Vermont we must have three, and in New Jersey we must have 14.

Even at this early stage in the campaign, we are encountering a huge amount of support from people fed up with unemployment, foreclosures, discrimination and all the other injustices of capitalist society. The PSL campaign’s demand of seizing the banks to provide jobs, education, housing, and healthcare for all is clearly resonating.

Source: PSL e-newsletter