Edward Emery Leamer, May 24, 1944 (La Crosse, Wis.) -
VP candidate for Kotlikoff for President (aka Non Affiliated aka Independent aka It's Our Children aka Unaffiliated) (2016)
Running mate with nominee: Laurence Jacob Kotlikoff (b. 1951)
Popular vote: 3,574 (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538
The campaign:
Boston-based economist Laurence Kotlikoff filed with the FEC on May 11, 2016 on his second quest for the US Presidency. In 2012 he had attempted to gain the nomination of the ill-fated Americans Elect project and was also a contender for the Reform Party nomination. In 2016 he ran as an independent under the Kotlikoff for President banner and chose fellow economist Ed Leamer as his VP.
Kotlikoff described his history with Leamer--
I first met Ed in 1973 when I started graduate school in economics at Harvard where Ed was serving as a young professor. Even though he was a professor and I was a student, we instantly became friends and have remained extremely close friends over the years. In 1975, Ed left Harvard for UCLA. I joined him there as a post doctoral fellow in 1977. I headed to Yale in 1980, but the three years with Ed were an exceptional education in how to pose and answer economic questions. Ed and I have spent the intervening years discussing economic policy problems and solutions. We are of one mind on our domestic problems and foreign policy challenges and how to address them. This includes the paramount importance of fixing our institutions from the ground up and placing our children's welfare at the center of all policy discussions.
Other than Leamer as VP, Kotlikoff's dream team would have raided the US Senate in several cases. His first picks included--
Sec. of Defense: John McCain or Lindsay Graham
Sec. of State: Robert Gates or Dennis Ross
CIA Director: Diane Feinstein
Sec. of Homeland Security: Rob Portman
Director of OMB: John Kasich
Sec. of Health and Human Service: Bernie Sanders
Sec. of Commerce: Mitt Romney or Bill Gates or Michael Bloomberg
Sec. of Interior: Marco Rubio
Sec. of Agriculture: John Thune
Sec. of HUD: Barbara Boxer
Sec. of Transportation: Kelly Ayotte
For more information on this campaign I would direct the reader to my interview with Dr. Leamer from nearly two years ago--
https://thirdpartysecondbananas.blogspot.com/2019/06/edward-e-leamer-2016-independent-vp.html
The ticket made the ballot in Colorado (0.01%) and Louisiana (0.05%) and were registered write-ins in at least 26 states with the potential of well over 270 Electoral College votes. Interestingly, nearly one third of their votes came from write-ins in Texas.
Election history: none
Other occupations: economist, teacher, author, editor, speaker
Notes:
Princeton (B.A., mathematics, 1966), University of Michigan (M.A., mathematics, Ph.D., economics, 1970).
