Democracy
Our democracy is on life support.
Belief in our political system is at historic lows and the number of Americans who feel that neither establishment party represents them is at a record high.
Researchers have found that today's US government is an oligarchy where policies are determined not by the will of the people but by the demands of corporate elites.
The Wall Street parties have systematically concentrated power in the hands of their wealthy donors, locking out the people from our rightful place at the decision-making table.
Full and meaningful participation in democracy is a human right. We need to revive our democracy with a full spectrum of reforms to empower the people, including real choice on the ballot - because without freedom of choice in elections, there is no democracy.
A Jill Stein administration will:
Replace the exclusionary two-corporate-party system with an inclusive multi-party democracy through ranked-choice voting and proportional representation
- Implement Ranked-Choice Voting for all elections nationwide
- Implement proportional representation for all legislative elections
- Work to overturn Citizens United and Buckley v. Valeo and abolish corporate personhood by Constitutional Amendment
- Institute full public financing of elections. Get the corrupting influence of private money out of politics and put the people back in.
- Abolish the Electoral College, and elect the president via national popular vote using ranked-choice voting
- Support a modern Voting Rights Act, including non-partisan redistricting commissions and same-day voter registration nationwide
- Restore the Preclearance provision of the Voting Rights Act
- Ensure a Constitutional right to vote and restore voting rights to all felons
- Pass Automatic Voter Registration (AVR) nationwide
- Restore the Preclearance provision of the Voting Rights Act
- Ensure a Constitutional right to vote and restore voting rights to all felons
- Pass Automatic Voter Registration (AVR) nationwide
- Make Election Day a federal holiday
- Expand polling locations and make free vote-by-mail an option for all elections, and expand polling locations
- End all discriminatory voting laws and the purging of voting rolls; repeal Shelby County v Holder (https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/court-cases/shelby-county-v-holder)
- Allow those who are under supervision or incarcerated to vote in elections, and be counted in the districts they resided in before incarceration
- Eliminate gerrymandering by enacting proportional representation
- Repeal discriminatory, anti-democratic ballot access restrictions designed by the establishment parties to suppress competition
- Expand initiative, referendum, and recall powers to every state and nationally
- Ensure open debates on public channels including all ballot-qualified candidates
- Provide free public airtime for all ballot-qualified candidates
- Oppose censorship by both the government and big tech corporations, and defend press freedom by applying antitrust laws to media conglomerates
- Expand Freedom of Information laws and whistleblower protections
- Protect the free Internet and net neutrality
- Safeguard election integrity with hand-counted paper ballots and routine post-election audits
- Lower the voting age to 16
- Grant immediate statehood for the District of Columbia
- Ensure self-determination for Puerto Rico and other colonial territories still under US rule
- Replace partisan oversight of elections and the presidential debates with independent, non-partisan election commissions
- Increase the number of Supreme Court justices from 9 to 18, with 18-year term limits staggered so that one seat opens per year
- Require a supermajority of ⅔ of the Supreme Court for judicial review of federal laws
- Enact a binding code of ethics for all judges, including Supreme Court justices
- Prohibit lobbying of any kind by former members of Congress.
- Ban stock trading by legislators
- Ban government contractors from donating to political campaigns
- Prohibit Congress from giving themselves any benefits they do not give to the people
- Support and fund participatory budgeting projects to engage the public in policy decisions
- Create a Federal Department of Equity to ensure that design and implementation of all policies (including climate policies) are equitable, as opposed to the historic victimization of poorer and marginalized communities.
"There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution." -John Adams