SWIFT AND JOHNSON VISIT MINNESOTA

1. KFAI Radio Story

2. Jesse Johnson at GPMN Meeting

3. Kat Swift at GPMN Forum

4. Kat Swift at GPMN Meeting

5. Jesse Johnson at GPMN Forum

Kat Swift and Jesse Johnson visited Minnesota Jan. 5 for a meeting and forum. In the morning, they attended the state winter membership meeting in St. Paul, where they visited with GPMN members. Johnson and Swift ate lunch with Lydia Howell from community radio station KFAI. In the afternoon they went back to the meeting and each spoke for about 7 minutes. There were about 100 members there, who received the candidates well.

In the evening, Johnson and Swift attended a presidential candidate forum over in Minneapolis. Danene Provencher said a few words about the Draft Nader campaign, Farheen Hakeem spoke on behalf of the Cynthia McKinney campaign, and David Strand updated the audience on the other candidates who were unable to attend.

Both candidates spoke about addressing the excesses of corporate power, and a range of other issues consistent with the Ten Key Values of the Green Party. Johnson called attention to the issue of mountain removal in Appalachia, saying that coal mining is now occurring at a rate of one mountain per hour. Swift said some of her priorities were repealing NAFTA, pardoning nonviolent drug offenders, a moratorium on the death penalty, and stopping domestic violence.

After the forum, interested Greens had a chance to visit at length with the candidates at a nearby restaurant.