New Progressive Alliance Candidate Questionnaire

Candidate name: Howie Hawkins and Brian Jones (Governor and Lieutenant Governor are one vote for one ticket in New York State)

Sex: Both male.

Age: Hawkins: 61; Jones: 41

Ethnicity: Hawkins: White; Jones: Black

Seat you are seeking: Governor and Lieutenant Governor of New York State

What motivated you to run for this office?

The 1% has two parties. Working people need one of their own. We have been building the Green Party in New York State to enable working people to meet, decide, speak, and act for themselves and elect working people to public office. The Greens asked us to run for Governor and Lieutenant Governor as part of this project. Hawkins is a working Teamster who unloads trucks at UPS in Syracuse. Jones is a union teacher with nine years in public schools in Harlem, East Harlem, and Brooklyn and now in a Ph.D. program in urban education at the CUNY Graduate Center.

What are your top issues and your plans for addressing them?

A Green New Deal for New York:

• The right to a job through public jobs for the unemployed.

• The right to an adequate income, built into the progressive income tax structure.

• The right to health care through a single public insurer.

• The right to affordable housing through investing in mixed-income, mixed-race, scattered-site public housing.

• The right to a good education, including full and equitable funding, rejection of high-stakes testing linked to Common Core, and desegregation.

• The right to affordable mobility through improving and expanding mass transit, including intra-city light rail, inter-urban rail, and long distance high-speed rail.

• The right to a sustainable environment, starting with building out a 100% clean energy system by 2030.

We pay for the Green New Deal by restoring the more progressive tax and revenue sharing policies New York State had in the 1970s with respect to personal and business income taxes, corporate subsidies, and the stock transfer tax.

We are also emphasizing a program to desegregate New York State: schools (New York's are the most segregated of the 50 states), housing (New York City is the most segregated US city, Syracuse is the most segregated mid-size city), the administration of justice (the war on drugs and mass incarceration have been directed at the African, Latino, and Native American communities), health care (hospital closings, few providers in communities disadvantaged by the double segregation of race and class), food (food deserts in disadvantaged communities), and financial services (predatory lenders preying on unbanked disadvantaged communities).

A full platform is at www.howiehawkins.org/platform.

Is this your first campaign? If no, please list previous campaigns including year and the seat for which you ran.

This is Brian Jones' first campaign for public office. He ran for Secretary of the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) in New York City on the slate of the Movement of Rank and File Educators in 2013. 

Howie Hawkins has run for the following offices:

2013 - Syracuse Common Council, 4th District, Green Party

2011 - Syracuse Common Council, 4th District, Green Party

2010 - Governor of New York, Green Party

2009 - Syracuse Common Council, 4th District, Green Party

2008 - U.S. House of Representatives, 25th District, NY, Green Populist

2007 - Syracuse City Council At-Large, Green Party

2006 - U.S. Senate, New York, Green Party

2005 - Mayor, Syracuse, NY, Green Party

2004 - U.S. House of Representatives, 25th District, NY, Peace and Justice Party

2003 - Syracuse City Council At-Large, Green Party

2002 - New York State Comptroller, Green Party

2001 - Syracuse Common Council, 4th District, Green Party

2000 - U.S. House, 25th District, NY, Green Party

1999 - Onondaga County Executive, Green Party

1998 - New York State Comptroller, Green Party

1997 - Syracuse Mayor, Green Party

1995 - Syracuse Common Council, At-Large, Green Party

1994 - Syracuse Common Council, At-Large, Green Party

1993 - Syracuse Common Council, At-Large, Green Party (on Liberal Party line)

What sets you apart from your opponents?

They are funded and represent the 1%. We are funded by and are organizing a party of, by, and for working people.

Both of our opponents, incumbent Democrat Andrew Cuomo and Republican Rob Astorino, are proponents of trickle-down tax cuts for the 1% paid for by cuts to schools and public services that the 99% use. We are for a bottom-up, wage-led economic program and progressive taxation.

They are for an “all-of-the-above” energy program. We are for all new energy investments directed to clean renewable sources.

They support the corporate privatization agenda for schools: charters, private education tax credits, and, in Astorino's case, vouchers. We are for full funding, replacing the test-and-punish high-stakes testing regime designed to privatize schools and bust teachers' unions with individual assessments designed by public educators instead of private contractors to support and improve schools, students, and teachers. They are silent on the double segregation by race and class in New York State. We have a program to desegregate New York housing, schools, health care, criminal justice, transit, financial services, and food access.

What is the BEST way for people wanting to volunteer for your campaign to get in touch? 

Go to www.howiehawkins.org/volunteer and sign up on the volunteer page. Our campaign staff will be in touch. 

Also make a contribution at https://howiehawkins.nationbuilder.com/donate. No one can fund us but us. Our political independence is dependent on our financial independence from the ruling ownership class. If we aren't serious about making regular contributions to our independent parties and candidates so we can get our message out to millions of voters, we are not serious about our politics. 

How soon should new volunteers expect to be contacted by your campaign

Within a day or two.