Libertarian Leader Contests Gillibrand Congressional Seat Special Election
Albany, NY Eric Sundwall, the Libertarian Party of New York State Chair, will seek the 20th Congressional District seat vacated by Kirsten Gillibrand when Governor Paterson appointed her to the Senate seat held by Hillary Clinton. Sundwall hopes to form a coalition of independents with disaffected Republicans
and Democrats. He notes that he is championing his opposition to the bailouts and his advocacy of the four points put forth by Congressman Ron Paul, MD (R-TX) and agreed to by 2008 minor party presidential candidates Ralph Nader, Bob Barr, Chuck Baldwin, and Cynthia McKinney . These are: ending the Iraq war and foreign military intervention; defending privacy and civil liberties; stopping the increase in the national debt; and curbing the Federal Reserve’s corporate welfare system.
Governor David Paterson will formally set the date of the special election as March 31st in a proclamation expected soon.
(Full disclosure: I am Eric Sundwall’s campaign manager. For more information about the campaign:
Elect Eric Sundwall
PO Box 503
Niverville, NY 12130
www.sundwall4congress.org) We will be using a historic tavern as headquarters. His town of Kindherhook was home for president Martin van Buren)
This will be Sundwall’s second try for the seat. In 2006, the Republicans forced him off the ballot led by a former judge active in the 2000 Florida recount battle. Many signatures of voters were invalidated because the correct township as opposed to the community they live in was not indicated. I was State Libertariarn Party chair then www.ny.lp.org.
This year he will have to gather 3500 signatures from voters in a mere 12 days instead of the usual and already difficult six weeks. The Republicans and Democrats will hold no primary and their candidates are automatically on the ballot. This disparity in treatment Sundwall condemns as unfair. Petition signature gathering cannot even begin until the Governor sets the date of the special election. Sundwall is confident that this can be done. He has garnered the support of Christina Tobin of Free and Equal www.freeandequal.org which seeks to qualify third-party alternatives in every Congressional district in 2010. Sundwall has also obtained the support of Greens and Conservatives in his district.
The Republican candidate is New York State Assembly Minority Leader James Tedisco and the Democrat candidate is Scott Murphy.
Sundwall is a small businessman computer consultant in the Capital District and became Libertarian State Chair in 2008. He is married with two small children. He helped start and
produced the Capital Outsider cable access TV program www.capitaloutsider.org. in Albany, New York -30-