Draft Effort Wants Bloomberg on Va., N.C. Ballots

Mon, January 07, 2008 - 10:53 AM

Virginia is among several states where efforts are under way to get New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's name onto presidential ballots, a New York City newspaper is reporting.
The New York Sun is reporting that the national chairman of the Draft Michael Bloomberg Committee says his group since Jan. 1 has gathered some 500 signatures toward putting the mayor's name on Virginia’s ballot.
"Our goal is to collect 20,000 signatures in Virginia and then move on to another state," Campbell told the newspaper. "We expect to move down to North Carolina next."
The Sun reported that Campbell, who is also chairman of the Independent Green Party of Virginia, said he hopes that by encouraging established third parties, such as the Green, Libertarian, and Independence parties, to petition to put Mr. Bloomberg on their ticket, his group can convince the mayor to run for president.
The news of such petitioning comes as Bloomberg and a dozen current and former elected officials from both parties are meeting in Norman, Okla., for a conference on ways to end “partisan polarization” in Washington.
Among the organizers of the conference are two former Democratic senators, Oklahoma’s David Boren and Georgia’s Sam Nunn, who last month both suggested they would consider urging Bloomberg to mount an independent presidential campaign if the major-party nominees to not embrace a track to more bipartisanship in dealing with the nation’s problems.

-- Billy House