Peter Camejo

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Peter Miguel Camejo (born December 31, 1939, New York City) is an American businessman, perennial candidate, and author. In 2004, he was selected by independent candidate Ralph Nader as his vice-presidential running mate on a ticket which had the endorsement of the Reform Party ^[1][2]. Camejo is a three time Green Party gubernatorial candidate most recently in 2006 receiving (2.3%) of the vote. Camejo also ran in the 2003 California recall election finishing fourth in a field of 135 candidates (2.8%), and 2002 finishing third with 5.3%. In January 2007, Camejo announced that he has been diagnosed with early-stage lymphoma, a cancer that is usually treatable.[1]. As of March, 2008 after a series of chemotherapy treatments, the cancer was in remission^[3], but in May it was announced that doctors had made a second diagnosis of lymphoma.^[4]

[edit] Early life

Camejo is a first-generation American of aristocratic Venezuelan descent. Although he spent his earliest years in Venezuela, he was born in the Queens borough of New York City where his mother lived when she flew from Venezuela to America during the depths of the Great Depression, giving him American citizenship without naturalization, which made possible his unsuccessful runs for President and Vice President. His parents, Elvia Guanche and Dr. Daniel Camejo Octavio,^[5] divorced when he was seven, and he came with his mother to reside in the United States — although on summer holidays he would return to Venezuela to visit relatives. He competed for Venezuela in yachting in the 1960 Summer Olympics.

He attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he played soccer and began his involvement in left-wing politics, and the University of California, Berkeley, where he studied history. In 1967, after winning a student council election at Berkeley, he was suspended for "using an unauthorized microphone" in a protest against the Vietnam War; as a result of these activities, he was deemed to be one of California's ten most dangerous citizens by then-governor Ronald Reagan.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Political evolution

Initially, Camejo was a member of the Socialist Workers Party, a Trotskyist party. As a branch organizer, he sought to reorient the SWP towards the student movement[2]. He was the SWP's nominee for President in 1976 and won 90,986 votes, or 0.1 percent.

The SWP's policy was to turn its members into "proletarians" by having them take jobs in factories and advocate for a worker-based class struggle. By 1980, Camejo came to disagree with this policy in favor of democratic socialism, and the SWP expelled him.

Camejo was quoted in 2002 as claiming that he was a watermelon--green on the outside but red on the inside.^[6]

[edit] Early gubernatorial campaigns

Camejo at UC Berkeley giving a lecture during the 2003 Gubernatorial Recall Election in California

In 2002, Camejo ran uncontested in the California Green Party gubernatorial primary. In the general election, he ran as part of the first full slate of Green candidates for all seven of California's partisan constitutional offices. Camejo lost the election to Governor Gray Davis, but he polled 393,036 votes, for 5.3 percent of the vote^[7], the largest vote total for a third party in the California governor's race in more than fifty years.^{[citation needed]} Because the San Francisco Green Party endorsed him, Camejo earned more votes in San Francisco than Republican gubernatorial nominee Bill Simon, a rarity in third-party politics. Camejo's alienation of the San Francisco local resulted in neither an endorsement nor any effort expended towards organizing for him in subsequent elections and he was unable to beat the Republican in San Francisco in 2003 and 2004.

In 2003, he was the endorsed Green Party candidate for governor (although several other Greens appeared on the ballot) in an unprecedented California recall election, in which he polled 242,247 votes, or 2.8 percent, coming in fourth in a field of 135 certified candidates. In a strange preview of the divisions about to erupt on the left in the following year, Camejo first cooperated with, and then competed with, fellow recall candidate Arianna Huffington. (During a press conference in support of Peter Camejo for California Governor, pranksters hit Nader in the face with a pie as Camejo looked on.)^[8]

[edit] 2004 Vice-Presidential campaign

Camejo was submitted as a candidate in the Green Party of California's March 2, 2004 Presidential Preference Primary. Before the primary, he made it known (though not in the state's official voter guide) that he was not planning to run for president and that any delegates pledged to him would not be committed to vote for him after the first round. The former gubernatorial candidate received 33,753 votes, or 75.9 percent, of the Green Party membership's support in California[3], and 72.7 percent of the votes in all Green Party primary elections[4].

Since Peter Camejo has run for Governor, voter support for Green candidates in California has fallen dramatically.

In June 2004, Camejo campaigned for the vice-presidential spot in the Reform Party ticket beside two-time Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader and ran against the Green Party nominee. With votes for Nader added in, the Nader/Camejo ticket had what appeared to be an insurmountable 83 percent of Green voters behind their candidacies going into the Green Party National Convention[5]. However, their lack of contrition about their intentions and Nader's last minute naming of Camejo as his running mate led to the appearance of a bait and switch deception, and did not play well with Green delegates.

Rejected by the Greens, Nader and Camejo continued their campaign as Reform Party candidates.

Both Nader and Camejo said the main reason they ran in the 2004 election was because there were no other national candidates demanding an immediate withdrawal of American troops from what they believe is an immoral and unconstitutionally pursued War in Iraq (though Cobb, Libertarian candidate Michael Badnarik, Constitution Party candidate Michael Peroutka, Socialist Party USA candidate Walt Brown and Socialist Workers Party candidate Róger Calero also opposed the war to varying degrees). However, unlike all of these candidates, because Ralph Nader was regularly invited to appear on mainstream news, the Nader and Camejo team were the only candidates who had a regular voice in the mainstream media arguing for withdrawal.

The Nader/Camejo ticket came in a distant third in the election, polling approximately 460,000 votes, or 0.4 percent of the vote. Camejo's supporters claimed vindication of their assertion that Nader/Camejo had four-to-one support within the party, as Cobb and running mate Pat LaMarche received scarcely a fifth of their support at 119,859 votes or 0.1 percent, a drop of 95 percent compared to the Green Party's 2000 national ticket.

[edit] 2006 governor campaign

In San Francisco, Peter Camejo demonstrates for peace and against war March 3, 2006.

Camejo made his third bid for Governor of California against incumbent Arnold Schwarzenegger and Democratic Party nominee Phil Angelides. Camejo received 193,553 votes, or 2.3 percent, part of a general trend of declining support for Green candidates in partisan races across the state that began when Camejo ran for high office.

[edit] Other political work

Just over a month after the 2004 election, Camejo was elected as one of California's delegates to the National Committee of the Green Party. At the 2005 Green Party National Convention, Camejo stated that he would not be a candidate for President in 2008.

Camejo has written a number of articles concerning the divisions evident in the Green Party in the aftermath of the turbulent 2004 national convention, continuing the themes of the Avocado Declaration in opposing attempts to "cozy up" to the newly-formed Progressive Democrats of America.

[edit] Family life

Camejo is married and has two children. He lives in Folsom, California, where he is currently Chief Executive Officer of Progressive Asset Management, a financial investment firm that encourages socially responsible projects. He is the author of "The SRI Advantage- Why Socially Responsible Investing Has Outperformed Financially", and other books. His newest book is "California: Under Corporate Rule," written with Green Party members Todd Chretien, Sarah Knopp, Rachel Odes, Don Bechler, Mehul Thakker, Forrest Hill, and Donna Warren, and is available at Vote Camejo.

[edit] Conflict within the Green Party

Camejo has been criticized by some Greens^[who?] for his 2004 Presidential election to run as an Reform Party candidate with Ralph Nader. During that campaign, Camejo described Greens who supported David Cobb as more Democratic than Green, labelling them "Demogreens."^{[citation needed]} In 2004, Camejo established the group Greens for Democracy and Independence (GDI), ostensibly as a declaration of independence from the Democratic Party. Some Greens^[who?] preferred None of the Above (NOTA) and chose David Cobb as a compromise to avoid association with Ralph Nader.^{[citation needed]}

In the run-up to the June 6, 2006 primary elections in his home state, Camejo created a California political action committee, Green IDEA (Independence, Democracy, Empowerment, Accountability), to run candidates for California Green County Councils, the local leadership bodies of the California Green Party[6]. Some Greens^[who?] consider outside intervention in local elections to be a contravention of the Green Ten Key Values of Decentralization and Grassroots Democracy.

Peter Daniels criticized Camejo for "lend[ing] his support to the right-wing effort to depose [California governor Gray] Davis" by recall in 2004. However, other Greens^[who?] dispute this assessment, noting that Camejo's objections to Davis were entirely consistent with his previous attempt to unseat him the year before[7]. In the end, the Green Party state convention easily voted to endorse Camejo as a recall replacement candidate, while the delegates could not find consensus on whether to support or oppose the recall question itself.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Publications

While a member of the Socialist Workers Party, Camejo wrote the book Racism, Revolution, Reaction, 1861-1877. The Rise and Fall of Radical Reconstruction, published by Pathfinder Press. [8]

As a candidate for California Governor, Camejo, along with other Green Party candidates and activists, wrote California Under Corporate Rule, which he self-published. [9]

[edit] Footnotes

[edit] See also

• Avocado Declaration

[edit] External links

• Camejo 2006 campaign website
• Green IDEA
• Official VoteCircle Profile
• Rigged Convention, Divided Party by Carol Miller and Forest Hill
• 'Is green the color of protest?' SFGate.com, August 2006
• Radio Interview with Jo Chamberlain, Indybay, June 2006
• CNN Factsheet On Peter Camejo, 2004
• San Francisco Chronicle campaign profile, 2002
• California election results
• The Avocado Declaration
• To Nader or Not to Nader? democracynow.org debate between Peter Camejo and David Cobb
• sf-frontlines.com article about the 2004 Green Party candidate selection (pro-Nader/Camejo)
• sf-frontlines.com article about the Nader/Camejo campaign rally in July 2004
• Peter Camejo speech at the Nader/Camejo 2004 campaign rally in San Francisco
• Progressive Asset Management website
• Mentions of Camejo during Berkeley Free Speech events