Karen Redleaf Schraufnagel, July 10, 1963 -
VP candidate for Socialist Action (2016)
Running mate with nominee: Jeffrey Mackler (b. 1940)
Popular vote: ? (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538
The campaign:
Socialist Action was founded in 1983 by a group that had been expelled, or resigned in protest, from the Socialist Workers Party. In turn, SA has seen several splits within their own ranks during their nearly 40 year history. Outside sources have generalized SA as a Trotskyite party.
Although the group had been involved in the election process to some degree at local and state levels, it was not until June 2016 they offered a national ticket. Jeff Mackler, a California retired teacher, union activist, and 2006 SA candidate for the US Senate was nominated for President. His running-mate was Minnesota-based Karen Schraufnagel, founder of Minnesotans Against Islamophobia. Mackler was also the party's National Secretary.
The 2016 SA platform--
1) Abolish the U.S. war machine now!
Bring all troops home now! Close all U.S. foreign and domestic military bases. End all military spending now – not a penny for war!
U.S. out of the Middle East!
No to U.S. overt and covert wars, drone wars, oil wars, privatized death squad wars, sanction and embargo wars or wars for the re-colonization of Africa.
Abolish NATO and all other imperialist military alliances!
Self-determination for all oppressed nations and peoples.
Self-determination for Puerto Rico. No to imperialist-imposed austerity in Puerto Rico. Abolish Puerto Rico’s debt to U.S. banks and speculating hedge funds.
Self-determination for Palestine! End all U.S. aid to apartheid Israel. For a democratic, secular Palestine with the right of all Palestinian refugees to return. Solidarity with Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaigns.
U.S. hands off the Cuban Revolution.
2) Immediate conversion to 100% renewable power: sun, wind, geothermal and micro-hydro! Keep all fossil fuels in the ground!
Guarantee jobs at top union wages for all fossil fuel workers during and after a just and rapid transition to clean and renewable energy systems.
Immediate conversion to carbon-sequestering agro-ecological farming.
Immediate halt to expansion of all new fossil fuel extraction and transportation projects
100% tax on all fossil fuel corporations. Zero profits for the polluters.
Close down and dismantle the fossil fuel industry, from extraction on up.
Dramatically expand mass transit – for the least mobile first; reverse urban sprawl and unsustainable development patterns. Remediate and expand our forests, wetlands and natural eco-systems.
For an immediate cleanup of Native American, African American and Latino communities that have been victimized by environmental racism.
No to nuclear weapons. Close all nuclear power plants now.
U.S. reparations and zero interest loans to neo-colonial and island nations suffering from climate change due to past practices of the major industrial and imperialist nations.
3) Jobs for all at top union wages!
Shorten the work week by 25 percent with no cut in pay so that everyone can work and enjoy more free time. Modern technology should benefit the 99 percent not the boss class one percent.
Create a massive public works program to provide jobs at top union wages through building homes, converting to 100% renewable power, expanding mass public transportation, constructing hospitals, parks, schools, and other social necessities. Priority should be given to projects where they are most needed—especially in Black and Latino communities.
Raise all pensions, Social Security benefits, unemployment and disability compensation, welfare, and veterans benefits to top union wage scales and protect them with cost-of-living escalator provisions.
For $15 and a union now as a first short step on the road to a much higher minimum wage to sustain a quality standard of living.
4) Quality health care, education and housing for all as basic rights!
Close down the profit-gauging “healthcare” insurance companies and establish a single-payer system in rapid transition to a universal and free national system, that is, socialized medicine.
Use the savings towards provision of quality health care for all and retraining insurance workers for new jobs.
Free quality public education at all levels from the cradle to the grave.
Cancel all student debt.
Void all drug patents to cut public costs to a minimum.
Cancel all medical debt.
End all home foreclosures.
Establish and expand rent-control to combat the mass-displacement of poor and oppressed communities through gentrification.
Massive government funding to repair, modernize, and build homes – starting where need is greatest.
5) End the racist, slave labor for profit prison-industrial complex!
End the racist school-to-prison pipeline.
Build schools, not jails.
Free Mumia Abu-Jamal, Oscar Lopez Rivera and all political prisoners.
Abolish the racist and classist death penalty.
Prosecute and jail killer cops
De-criminalize all drugs. Take the profit out of drug trafficking. End the racist “war on drugs.” Massive investment in restorative justice, mental health, and drug treatment services.
Rapidly empty the prisons while immediately organizing quality, humane rehabilitation facilities to rebuild ruined lives.
End “zero tolerance” school policies. Cops out of the schools.
Abolish racist “money ball” extortion schemes including defendant-funded court proceedings, mandatory court surcharges, fines and fees.
Abolish all racist exclusionary election laws.
For Black and Latino-organized control of Black and Latino communities. Police out of Black and Latino neighborhoods.
Reparations for African-American, Puerto-Rican, and Mexican-American communities in compensation for wealth stolen over centuries.
6) Immediate amnesty, legalization and equal rights for all immigrants. End the racist, Islamophobic “War on Terror!”
End all deportations now!
Repeal all anti-immigrant legislation.
Close down ICE
Demilitarize and open the borders.
No to the surveillance, persecution, demonization and government-orchestrated frame-up trials in Muslim communities in the U.S. and worldwide.
7) Abolish all racist, sexist and homophobic discriminatory laws and practices!
Equal pay for equal work.
Affirmative action with quotas to remedy past discrimination and prevent future discrimination.
To assure economic independence for women, government-financed, free 24-hour child-care centers and maternity leave with full pay. Guarantee the right of every mother to raise a healthy child.
End violence against women and the LGBTQI community.
Repeal the Hyde Amendment. Free unrestricted abortion on demand.
Reproductive justice now. End coercive contraception projects targeting low income women and women in prison. End the criminalization of pregnant women.
Free Purvi Patel.
Ban workplace and housing discrimination and adoption restrictions based on sexual orientation or gender identity
Outlaw discrimination by businesses or employees based on sexual preference or gender identity
Repeal all local, state and federal discriminatory laws against LGBTQI people.
Quality safe housing for youth and workers facing discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
8) Defend civil liberties! Abolish the “national security” state!
End all government surveillance. Abolish the National Security Administration and all other secret and repressive government spy agencies.
Repeal the Patriot Act and all other anti-democratic legislation.
End all restrictions on the right to organize, assemble, and protest.
Stop the persecution of all whistle blowers like Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden!
9) For a democratically-planned socialist economy where the banks, basic industries and all natural resources are the collective property of working people – the 99 percent – and democratically operated for human betterment not the individual profits of the one percent
Tax the rich and their corporations, not working people! End corporate bailouts! [Note:$32 trillion in corporate bailouts was granted to corporate America in the years immediately following the 2008 economic crash. See Project Censored Report. For every dollar paid in taxes by U.S. corporations $27 is granted back in government subsidies. See: 2016 Oxfam Report.]
Close all tax loopholes for the rich. Nationalize all illegally “offshored” corporate profits.
For a steeply-graduated progressive income tax!
100% tax on all incomes over $300,000. Zero percent tax on all incomes under $50,000.
Low interest, long-term government loans to protect small farmers gouged by banks and food trusts.
End all military and military-related spending: Use the money saved towards a massive public works program and to fulfill the demands above.
10) For working class political action independent of and against the twin parties of capitalism
For a united, democratic and fighting labor movement that champions the economic, social and political interests of all working people.
For a Labor Party based on a revitalized, democratic, and expanded labor movement allied with the oppressed and exploited.
Organize the unorganized 90 percent! Repeal Taft Hartley and all other anti-union legislation.
Open the corporate books for union inspection!
Vote Socialist Action! For a workers government and a fully democratic society of, by and for working people and the oppressed! Abolish capitalism! For socialism!
SA did not place a high priority on the nuts and bolts of traditional campaigning, such as making an effort to attain ballot status or even become a registered write-in. They appeared to be more involved with feet on the ground demonstrations, gathering petitions, panel discussions, and other more grassroots methods of political warfare. Hence, no votes for Mackler/Schraufnagel were officially reported.
Mackler, who also ran in 2020, was cautiously endorsed in both elections by the Freedom Socialist Party. Their Oct. 17, 2016 essay supporting the SA ticket does help the uninitiated identify and differentiate the nuances of progressive parties in that year--
This Year of the Detestable Election, exercise your democratic rights with a protest vote!
October 17, 2016
Once again, the U.S. two-party system has left us with two horrible choices.
Playing on people’s fear and resentment over acute social and economic problems, bombastic bigot Donald Trump has positioned himself as an anti-establishment populist. But he is an enemy, not a friend of the people – a braggart about his sexual assaults and an inciter of violence against Muslims, journalists, and whatever group is the current target of his poisonous diatribes. He has made himself the focal point for a dangerous right-wing movement that could end up laying the ground for fascism.
Thus, the pressure to vote for Hillary Clinton as the “anybody but Trump” candidate is tremendous. And Clinton’s bid for the presidency is a historic one, which she promotes largely with claims to be an advocate for women and children. However, her record and her party’s record show that these claims are false, as are her other promises to workers and oppressed people.
While her husband was in office, Clinton supported the destruction of welfare, the anti-gay Defense of Marriage Act, and racist crime bills that led to the largest increase in incarceration under any president in history. During the years she served as the only woman on Walmart’s Board of Directors, she did nothing while the company waged war on attempts to unionize its employees, many of them on food stamps. As Secretary of State, she was responsible for much of the suffering internationally caused by U.S. wars, occupations, and trade policies. And these examples barely scratch the surface of her pro-corporate credentials.
As a feminist organization, the Freedom Socialist Party (FSP) abhors the sexism against Clinton, including Trump’s misogynist bullying. But there’s no way we could support her for president. The truth is that the “lesser evil” is a myth and a scam, one that keeps the country’s people trapped in a downward spiral as the Democrats and Republicans both keep moving rightward. The most effective vote in November is a protest vote — and, fortunately, there are socialist candidates running who are well worth supporting.
Cast Your Ballot for Working-Class Champions Who Stand for Real Change
FSP is offering critical support to Socialist Action (SA) write-in candidates Jeff Mackler for president and Karen Schraufnagel for vice president. Their far-reaching platform includes abolishing the U.S. war machine; getting rid of racist, sexist and homophobic laws and practices; providing amnesty and equal rights for all immigrants; and defending labor. However, FSP is critical of such things as SA’s opportunism in the anti-war movement, where it has opposed taking an anti-capitalist stand, and its position on Syria, which underestimates the role of genuine popular revolt there.
SA’s Syria position comes close to that of two groups whose candidates FSP is not recommending, Workers World Party and Party for Socialism and Liberation, which go farther than SA by supporting dictator Assad on the false grounds that he is “anti-imperialist.”
The Socialist Party (SP) and Socialist Workers Party are also fielding candidates, but their programs suffer in comparison to Socialist Action’s — and, in SP’s case, their electoral representatives don’t seem bound to a party platform in any case.
The Bernie Sanders campaign raised important reforms and the earnest hopes of many supporters. At bottom, however, it was never more than a vehicle for the Democratic Party to hold on to progressive voters. Now some Sanders enthusiasts are turning to Jill Stein of the Green Party. But Stein’s solutions — like making “Wall Street, big corporations, and the rich pay their fair share of taxes” — are a pallid answer to a fundamental crisis of the profit system.
The Libertarian Party of Gary Johnson, meanwhile, attracts interest because it purports to stand for individual freedoms, but its basic support is for the capitalist freedom to exploit without fetters of any kind.
It’s Time for an Independent Labor Party
Whoever wins the election, everyday people are in for a continued rough ride, with fights looming against everything from union-busting to environmental despoliation and killings by police.
Our fights should include ending the two-party lockdown of U.S. elections. We need reforms that would give minor parties a chance — changes like eliminating the myriad of restrictive ballot access laws (see Seven steps for ballot access reform) and instituting instant-runoff voting and proportional representation.
These reforms would help to make possible what we need more than ever — the development of a mass anti-capitalist party that truly represents the working class, especially its lowest-paid and most-abused members. An independent labor party based in the unions, but representing both organized and unorganized workers, could fight in the here and now for things like full employment and universal, not-for-profit healthcare. It could also be a huge step toward upending the whole exploitative system that depends on this two-party scam for its survival.
Enough of the trap of “lesser-evil” voting!
Election history: none
Other occupations: founder of Minnesotans Against Islamophobia
Notes:
Schraufnagel gave this blog a nice plug when I interviewed SA 2020 VP Heather Bradford in 2019.
