Darcy Richardson is hoping to win the Reform Party’s presidential nomination later this week.
Richardson, who lives in Jacksonville,is a familiar name to many activists and political junkies across the nation. Besides serving as the campaign manager for former U.S. Sen. Eugene McCarthy’s, D-Minn., independent presidential campaign in 1988, Richardson is an expert on third-party politics, having written a multivolume history on them and he also writes in various media outlets.
“I’ll be seeking the Reform Party’s presidential nomination next weekend in Long Island. The party… seems like a good match and is certainly worth preserving,” Richardson emailed Independent Political Report which broke the news. “Each of us, I suppose, must bear witness for the times in which we live. In the irrational age of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton — with the country’s leading nationally-organized third party playing the role of apologist for the presumptive Democratic nominee while trying to gain the establishment’s blessing — a Reform Party candidacy begins to make some sense.”
Richardson has been increasingly politically active in recent years. Back in 2010, economist and gubernatorial candidate Farid Khavari tapped Richardson as his running mate as they ran with no party affiliation. Richardson took on President Barack Obama in the 2012 primaries but ended up dropping out to support former Louisiana Gov. Buddy Roemer’s short lived presidential bid outside of the major parties which included seeking the Reform Party nod.
From having backed Ross Perot, Roemer and Ralph Nader, Richardson is no stranger to the Reform Party . After Roemer ended his presidential bid in 2012, Richardson sought the party nomination. Richardson is currently working on a book on the Reform Party.
The party had some highs back in the late 1990s with Perot almost taking 10 percent on its line in the 1996 presidential election and Jesse Ventura winning the Minnesota governorship as a Reform Party candidate in 1998. But party factionalism and in-fighting limited its impact as the party swang to the right to nominate Pat Buchanan in 2000 only to swing over to the left to back Nader four years later. Its two most recent presidential candidates--Ted Weill in 2008 and Andre Barnett in 2012--each pulled in less than 1,000 votes.
The Reform Party will hold its convention in Bohemia, New York starting Friday. Besides Richardson, Ken Cross, who had been the party’s vice presidential candidate in 2012, Ed Chlapowski, Lynn Kah and former Democratic presidential hopeful Rocky De La Fuente are seeking the Reform Party nod.
Independent Political Report noted that political activist Thomas Kanpp, who had been running as a write-in candidate against Congressman Ted Yoho in North Florida, is seeking the Reform Party’s vice presidential nomination.
