Actress Roseanne Barr announced Thursday that she is seeking the Peace and Freedom Party’s nomination for president, with anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan as her intended running mate.
Barr sought the Green Party’s nomination earlier this year, but lost to Massachusetts physician Jill Stein.
Her renewed candidacy, first reported by the Los Angeles Times, will likely hurt the lesser-known Stein’s footing. Stein’s running mate is also relatively unknown, unlike Sheehan, who became famous for protesting the Iraq War outside President George W. Bush’s Texas ranch.
Kevin Akin, a spokesman and organizer for the Peace and Freedom Party, informed The Daily Caller that the party will make its decision on Saturday.
Barr’s nomination “looks fairly likely to me at this point, but I may be wrong because there are so many people who are uncommitted,” said Akin.
“Thirty people are committed to one person or another and the rest are uncommitted, out of about 85 delegates,” said Akin.
Barr’s chances are likely buoyed by the fact that former Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson, a former Democrat, informed party officials this week that he was discontinuing his quest for the party’s nomination.
Founded in 1967, the Peace and Freedom Party is a relatively well-known, but small, left-wing party. In 1968 its presidential candidate was Black Panther leader Eldridge Cleaver.
Akin said the party will have ballot access in California, and likely in Florida — where he said organizers have until Saturday to clinch ballot listing ahead of November’s vote. He said the party’s nominee will almost certainly appear on other states’ ballots via cross-listing by other minor parties.
“Roseanne Barr, who seems to have considerale national attention, will probably be able to get the nominations of several of those minor parties,” Akin said, noting that Ralph Nader — the Green Party’s candidate in 1996 and 2000 — ran as an independent in 2004 and 2008 and appeared on many state ballots.
One distinction between the Green Party and the Peace and Freedom Party, Akin explained, is that “the word ‘socialist’ is often attached to our party and we don’t mind it one bit, [but] the Green Party typically avoids it.”
The tagline on Barr’s candidate statement on the Peace and Freedom Party’s website reads: “Socialism – it’s not just for Wall Street, military contractors, or Congress anymore, but all Americans!”
In June, Barr told TheDC about her particular dislike of Republican candidate Mitt Romney, joking about his Mormon faith and cautioning voters against voting for someone “who thinks Jesus was hanging out with the Indians and that the Romneys will be running their own planets in the hereafter.” (SEE ALSO: Roseanne jokes about ‘a whole big crowd of Mitt’s grandmothers’)
Her bombastic style will likely be on full display until November if she wins the Peace and Freedom Party nomination. On Obama, she previously told TheDC, “If you press me, I suppose I’d have to say I find him less odious than Robme.” However, she said, either would “cater to the big moneyed interests that basically control everything.”
Barr’s Twitter account frequently attracts news coverage for the incendiary political commentary she shares with followers. Earlier this week she apologized after tweeting: “Anyone who eats Shit Fil-A deserves to get the cancer that is sure to come from eating antibiotic filled tortured chickens 4Christ.”
Stein may not be the only third-party candidate with something to worry about. In July Libertarian Party presidential candidate Gary Johnson told TheDC he was glad that Barr — with whom he shares a handful of anti-war and anti-authoritarian political positions — wouldn’t be “a distraction” in the November election.
