OH Exclusive: Socialist Candidate for US Senate Makes Appeal to Progressive Voters Following Brunner's Defeat in Dem Primary

At The Examiner, John Michael Spinelli sums up the results for the Democratic Party's primary for the US Senate race in Ohio:

At the end of Tuesday, in the wee hours of Wednesday, the live unofficial election results at the Ohio Secretary of State's office showed Lee Fisher with 55.3 percent and 339,479 votes compared to the 44.7 percent and 274,616 votes going to Jennifer Brunner, an opponent who hoped to become the first woman U.S. Senator from Ohio, he congratulated in a statement for running a hard-fought and substantive campaign.

Spinelli reports on an open letter by Socialist Party candidate for US Senate, Dan La Botz, to Fisher following her defeat:

The Socialist Party . . . candidate, Dan La Botz of Cincinnati . . . saw the rancor that brewed between Fisher and Brunner over the months and threw a Hail Mary pass for support in November in an open letter to Brunner, who he asked to swing her voters his way based on La Botz's belief his position and those of Brunner were in close alignment, and that Fisher won't fight for them but he will.

La Botz has now written an open letter to Brunner's supporters, urging them "not to give up the fight for [their] principles." Here is the text of La Botz's letter, in full, a TPID exclusive:

An Open Letter to Supporters of Jennifer Brunner from Dan La Botz

Dear Friends,

Jennifer Brunners’s defeat in the Democratic Party primary election is a sad commentary on the Democratic Party, where progressive candidates so often go down to defeat before others with a patronage machine or more money. Yet, even though Brunner won’t be on the ballot, you don’t have to give up the fight for your principles.

Your principles are important to you. You supported Jennifer Brunner because you saw her as the progressive candidate who supported single payer health care, who wanted to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and who wanted to address the environmental issues.

You supported her because you could see that Lee Fisher represented a more or less standard Democratic Party politician, and because Rob Portman, the Republican candidate and George W. Bush’s “free trade” man who has courted the Tea Party, was politically repugnant to you.

And you’re right. Brunner was the more progressive candidate. The Democratic Party, however, didn’t want her. And the conservative PACs, corporate executives, and the very wealthy made it clear by donations of millions of dollars to Portman and to Fisher, that they didn’t want her either.

So what are your choices? Rob Portman, the economic conservative who flirts with the Tea Party. Or Fisher, the typical Democrat, the guy you didn’t like, didn’t want, and still really don’t? Don’t vote for what you don’t believe in. Don’t waste your vote on a Democrat who won’t fight for Medicare for all. Who won’t fight to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Who won’t fight against oil, coal and nuclear power. And who won’t fight for marriage equality. When you vote for people you don’t really want, you can be sure you won’t be happy with the result.

We need to move American politics to the left. Send the Democrats and Republicans a message. Make your vote count. Let them know that you want progressive politics in Congress. Both the Republicans and the Democrats, representing as they do the corporations and their agenda, can’t also represent the American working people and a progressive agenda. We need to build an independent political party in this country and we need to build a social movement as the foundation of that party. Join me in doing that.

Go to my website, DanLaBotz.com, and look at my statements on the issues. If you were a Jennifer Brunner supporter, you will be pleased to find that there is still a candidate on the ballot who supports all the things that are important to you. And has spent his life fighting for them.

Most important, when you go to the polls in November, don’t waste your vote on Republican or Democratic Party candidates who won’t fight for the progressive agenda you believe in. Vote for Dan La Botz, Ohio Socialist Party candidate for the U.S. Senate. I believe in and will fight for the issues you care about.

Dan La Botz