Home-Grown 3rd Party Candidate Pledges to Exit Race if Biden Falters in Md.
Maryland’s home-grown third party presidential candidate, Jerome M. Segal, has written to 1 million Maryland voters, assuring them he’ll drop out of the White House election if Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s lead over President Donald Trump falls to less than 10 points in state polls.
Jerome M. Segal
Segal, a retired University of Maryland lecturer, is the standard bearer of the Bread and Roses Party, which he established and stood up over the past year after unsuccessfully challenging U.S. Sen. Benjamin L. Cardin in the 2018 Democratic primary. He’s one of three third-party presidential candidates who will appear on Maryland’s ballot this fall. Libertarian Jo Jorgensen and Howie Gresham Hawkins of the Green Party are the others.
Segal’s letter to Maryland voters serves as an introduction to his left-leaning party, which is seeking to redefine the workplace and the American Dream and support Palestinians’ rights, among other things. He explains the origin of the party’s name and lays out its platform.
“We take our name from the historic 1912 strike led by women textile workers in Lawrence, Massachusetts,” he writes “They unfurled a new banner, ‘Bread, and roses too.’
“They were saying, ‘We may be poor, we may be immigrants, but material needs are not the sum total of who we are. We are complex human beings with needs not just for bread, but for Beauty, Meaning and the Time to pursue the things in life that matter most.'”
In his letter, Segal also seeks to assure voters in Maryland ― where Biden is expected to defeat Trump by at least 25 points ― that he does not intend to be a spoiler.
“Because defeating Donald Trump is priority #1, I am not running in any swing state, and I will drop out of the race in Maryland if Biden’s lead over Trump drops to less than 10 points between now and Election Day,” he wrote.
Even if Segal dropped out of the race at this late date, he’d still appear on the Maryland ballot.
The Bread and Roses Party has earned the right to appear on the Maryland ballot this year and in 2022. Its performance will help determine whether it can stay there in future elections.
Segal and the Bread and Roses Party also are on the ballot in Vermont this year ― another state that is likely to vote strongly for Biden.
Josh Kurtz
Founding editor
Founding Editor Josh Kurtz is a veteran chronicler of Maryland politics and government. He began covering the State House in 1995 for The Gazette newspapers, and has been writing about state and local politics ever since. He was an editor at Roll Call, the Capitol Hill newspaper, for eight years, and for eight years was the editor of E&E Daily, which covers energy and environmental policy on Capitol Hill. For 6 1/2 years Kurtz wrote a weekly column on state politics for Center Maryland and has written for several other Maryland publications as well. Kurtz regularly gives speeches and appears on TV and radio shows to discuss Maryland politics.
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