John Forbes Kerry

 

John Forbes Kerry, December 11, 1943 (Aurora, Colo.) -

VP candidate for Independent (2016)

Running mate with nominee: Roger Koplitz
Popular vote: ? (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538

The campaign:

I will go out on a limb here and guess that the stealth campaign of Roger Koplitz for President in 2016 had the former senator and 2004 Democratic Presidential nominee in mind when he listed John Kerry as his running-mate. At the time of the election Kerry was serving as US Secretary of State. Assigning the VP spot to well known politicians and other celebrities without their permission by Independent candidates is common enough to make this a reasonable assumption.

The Koplitz/Kerry ticket were registered as write-ins only in the State of Minnesota.

Election history:
1972 - US House of Representatives (Mass.) (Democratic) - defeated
1983-1985 - Lt. Governor of Massachusetts (Democratic)
1985-2013 - US Senator (Mass.) (Democratic)
2004 - US President (Democratic) - defeated

Other occupations: US Navy (Vietnam era), attorney, US Sec. of State, US Special Presidential Envoy for Climate

Notes:
Kerry was the last Democrat running for President to lose the popular vote.
Full disclosure: I voted for Kerry in 2004. Quite frankly I was more opposed to the policies of Bush than I was in favor of those held by Kerry.
Other gentlemen who have served as US Senators from Mass. who were third party VPs: Edward Everett, Edward Kennedy, and Scott Brown. Kennedy and Brown, like Kerry, were involuntarily named by an individual, not by a convention.

Scott Philip Brown

 

Scott Philip Brown, September 12, 1959 (Kittery, Me.) -

VP candidate for Independent Republican (2012)

Running mate with nominee: Barbara Ann Marie Prokopich (b. 1943)
Popular vote: 2 (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538

The campaign:

Barb Prokopich of (Washington State trivia alert!!!) Elk, Wash. in Spokane County ran for US President in 2012 as a registered write-in in nine states apparently feeling that the Republican Party was not conservative enough. On Nov. 1, 2012 the Spokesman-Review reported she "doesn't agree with Romney's policies although she would've picked Paul Ryan as a running mate." Ryan was already called for but as it turns out she had at least three VP choices on record-- Allen R. "Al" Farnham, Rick Santorum, and Scott Brown.

In a voters guide introducing write-in candidates in Maryland, Prokopich's entry read--

Barbara Prokopich
AGE: 68
PARTY: Republican
HEADQUARTERS: Mead, Wash.
VICE-PRESIDENT: Sen. Scott Brown, R-Mass.

Prokopich has lived in Washington for the last 20 years. The former Marine is the mother of two boys. Fiscal responsibility is a big issue with Prokopich, as is removing the U.S. from the United Nations. She chose Scott Brown as her running mate, because "he's an excellent human being," although she has not been able to reach Brown personally yet and has had to extend the honor through his aides.

I have not found Brown's response, if there was any. He was busy in 2012 running for reelection in a campaign he would ultimately lose.

One of the problems with researching a political campaign that took place in Century 21 is if the candidate used social media like Twitter, Youtube, and Facebook, and then deleted most everything after the election as Prokopich appears to have done, that information vanishes forever. Future historians are going to find it quite maddening when they try to make sense of our era.

Prokopich received 41 recorded write-in votes total. Vice Presidents were not reported in Idaho, Illinois (4 votes), Maryland (2 votes), Washington, and West Virginia. We know she intended Brown to be her running mate in Maryland but cannot guess who would be in the others. Farnham was the VP in Alaska, Kentucky, and Montana, with zero votes reported for all three. Santorum was the VP in Minnesota with 35 votes, her best result in any state.

Election history:
1992-1995 - Assessor, Wrentham, Mass.
1995-1998 - Board of Selectmen, Wrentham, Mass.
1998-2004 - Massachusetts House of Representatives (Republican)
2004-2010 - Massachusetts State Senate (Republican)
2010-2013 - US Senate (Mass.) (Republican)
2012 - US Senate (Mass.) (Republican) - defeated
2014 - US Senate (N.H.) (Republican) - defeated
 
Other occupations: Army National Guard, model, attorney, Fox News pundit, employed by Nixon Peabody, AdvoCare representative, United States Ambassador to New Zealand and Samoa, law school dean

Notes:
Winner in the 2012 election was Elizabeth Warren.
First current or former US Senator to endorse Trump in 2016.