On November 6, Californians will be voting in the 2018 Gubernatorial Elections, an election that will also include elections of lieutenant governor, senators, state representatives, attorney general and several key executive official positions.

Seven Peace and Freedom Party candidates to date have filed to run for statewide office in the June 2018 California Primary. Our current slate of candidates, plus one independent candidate the PFP is endorsing, is as follows.

Gloria La Riva — Peace and Freedom Party candidate, Governor
Gloria La Riva is a veteran social justice, anti-war and union activist and organizer. She was 2010 and 2014 candidate for governor, and 2016 Peace and Freedom Party and Party for Socialism and Liberation candidate for U.S. president.

Gayle McLaughlin —
Peace and Freedom Party endorsee, Lieutenant Governor
Gayle McLaughlin is a former two-term mayor of Richmond, where she founded the Richmond Progressive Alliance. As mayor, Gayle led Richmond’s remarkable transformation which included reducing homicides by 75%, increasing the minimum wage, promoting sustainable development, advocating rent control, defending immigrant rights, progressively taxing corporate interests, defending public schools and opposing the expansion of charter schools. Gayle is proudly corporate-free and running for Lieutenant Governor with one concept at center: People First!

John Thompson Parker —
Peace and Freedom Party candidate, U.S. Senator
John is a coordinator of the International Action Center, an elected member of the Peace and Freedom Party State Central Committee, and an activist with the Workers World Party. He is a socialist who seeks to represent the working class rather than the billionaires. John says, “In these days when the Trump administration is trying to divide and weaken the working class, solidarity in each other’s struggles is our most important weapon.” Among John’s top priorities as a U.S. Senator include stopping police killings, redistributing monies devoted to “endless wars” into social necessities such as free healthcare, and ending the prison-industrial complex.

C.T. Weber — Peace and Freedom Party candidate, Secretary of State
C.T. Weber was a long-time union organizer, steward, and elected leader (including four two-year terms on the California State Employees Association Board of Directors. As Service Employees International Union, Local 1000, District Labor Council 784 president, he served on the SEIU Local 1000 State Council and was a delegate to the Sacramento Central Labor Council. Currently, he serves as a delegate to the Sacramento Central Labor Council, representing California Alliance for Retired Americans. He is also director of public relations for the Retired Public Employees Association.

Nathalie Hrizi —
Peace and Freedom Party candidate, Insurance Commissioner
Nathalie Hrizi is a public school teacher in San Francisco, a union and social justice activist, and editor of the quarterly magazine Breaking the Chains: A Socialist Perspective on Women’s Liberation. She ran for Insurance Commissioner in 2014, winning 212,991 votes, or 5.6 percent of the total cast.

Kevin Akin — Peace and Freedom Party candidate, State Treasurer
Kevin Akin of Riverside is a retired hospital maintenance worker who has been an activist in the Peace and Freedom Party and for peace and social justice since he was a teenager. He was the Peace and Freedom Party nominee for State Treasurer in 1982 and is running again in 2018. He advocates forming a California State Bank to keep tax money out of the hands of the profiteers and serve the needs of the people; revising the tax code to lift the burden from workers and the poor and make those who benefit the most from this economy pay for social needs; and breaking up the disproportionate influence of the billionaires and their corporations on state financial decisions.

Mary Lou Finley —
Peace and Freedom Party candidate, State Controller
Mary Lou Finley advocates reducing the tax burden on working people and shifting it to those best able to pay, the wealthy who benefit from the current economic system. The State Controller serves on 76 boards and commissions, in addition to being the state’s chief bookkeeper and auditor, and is very influential on tax policy and tax legislation. Mary Lou is recently retired from the San Diego Unified School District and is a member of the California School Employees Association. She has been active for many years against police brutality, for freeing Leonard Peltier and other political prisoners, and in local campaigns for social justice issues and for progressive candidates.

Jordan Mills — Peace and Freedom Party candidate, U.S. Congress
Jordan Mills is an educator and union organizer from Oceanside. He’s spent 25 years fighting for the rights of oppressed people in California. Since 2000, he’s been a professor and debate coach at Southwestern College in San Diego County. Jordan Mills believes the 16 years of Darrell Issa in Congress is more than enough, and in Election 2018, Jordan is the only independent candidate to challenge Issa. The working people of the 49th district need a change from oligarchs and austerity.