The following fifteen platform amendment proposals have been approved by the National Committee of the Green Party of the United States. The delegates to 2020 Presidential Nominating Convention must still approve these proposed amendments by a two-thirds vote at the convention as described below. The Platform Committee will schedule platform hearings in a workshop format at least a day before the final vote, for discussions, questions, and answers concerning changes and additions to the platform. No substantial changes or new amendments can be introduced at this stage.
Section 5-8 Approval of Platform
5-8.1 Once the Report of the Credentials Committee has been adopted as specified under Section 5-7, the Convention shall consider approval of the Platform.
5-8.2 Approval of the Platform shall be by the process as specified by the Green National Committee in Article II. 2. of the Bylaws of the Green Party of the United States; and in accordance with the Platform Timeline & Process, the process as established by the Green National Committee September 15, 2002. The voting threshold for approval shall be 2/3 as defined in Article V. Voting Rules of the Bylaws of the Green Party of the United States.
5-8.2(a) The Platform Committee Co-Chairs or other spokespersons designated by the Platform Committee shall be afforded not more than ten minutes to present the report of the Platform Committee and proposed 2008 Platform to the Convention. The presenter(s) for the Platform Committee shall also be afforded the final ten minutes of debate or discussion for closing remarks before the question of adoption of the Platform is put to the Convention.
5-8.2(b) Discussion on the proposed Platform shall be limited to one hour. No delegate may address the Convention for longer than two minutes on any provision of the draft Platform. To address the convention, a delegate is required to register, with their name, delegation, draft Platform provision to be addressed, and their position on such provision with the Convention facilitation team not later than the convening of the Convention plenary session scheduled to consider the Platform. A delegate may make a motion from the floor to strike a provision from the platform if they have also presented signatures of at least 10 percent of convention delegates in support of that motion at the time they register to speak. The vote on a motion to strike a proposed amendment shall require a 2/3 threshold. Removal is limited to provisions amended in the current cycle. No new provisions may be introduced from the floor.
5-8.2(c) The voting threshold for the adoption of the Platform shall be 2/3 of Convention Delegates, as defined in Article II. 2. and Article V. Voting Rules of the Bylaws of the Green Party of the United States.
5-8.2(d) Should the Convention fail to adopt the proposed Platform, the Platform Committee is instructed to re-title the existing Green Party Platform as the current Green Party Platform, and to report it to the Green National Committee, which shall be authorized to publish it as the Platform of the Green Party of the United States.
Chapter I – DEMOCRACY
Proposal Sponsor: Green Party of California
Amend Chapter I, Democracy, Section A, Political Reform to read:
b. Enact Ranked Choice Voting for chief executive offices like mayor, governor and president and other single-seat elections. Under Ranked Choice Voting, voters can rank candidates in their order of preference (1,2,3, etc.) Ranked Choice Voting ensures that the eventual winner has majority support and allows voters to express their preferences knowing that supporting their favorite candidate will not inadvertently help their least favored candidate. Ranked Choice Voting thus frees voters from being forced to choose between the lesser of two evils, and saves money by eliminating unnecessary run-off elections.
g. Abolish the Electoral College and provide for the direct national election of the president by Ranked Choice Voting.
Proposal Sponsor: Eco-Action Committee
Amend Chapter I, Democracy, Section E, Domestic Security by adding new sub-section 1 and adjusting the numbering of subsequent points accordingly
Proposed Changes
1. Immediately address environmental degradation in all forms. Environmental degradation poses extremely pressing concerns to both domestic and international security, amongst other things. An increasing frequency / intensity of extreme weather events as a whole are stressing global food, water, financial, security, energy, transportation, emigration/immigration, and other systems – pitting the self-interests of normally peaceful nations against each other. See chapter III for more detail.
Chapter II – SOCIAL JUSTICE
Proposal Sponsor: Eco-Action Committee
Amend Chapter II, Social Justice, Section A, Civil Rights and Equal Rights, Sub-section 10, Consumer Protection point c.
Proposed Changes
c. Preserve and expand product-labeling requirements to ensure that consumers are fully informed about the origin, ingredients, and ecological life cycle of all products, including animal testing, and the product’s organic, recycled, and genetically engineered content. Include information about the nutritional value and the vegetarian or vegan status of food products. Require stringent “Eco-Labeling” requirements which show the “environmental impacts associated with the production or use of a product.” This may include land use, water use, waste byproducts, emissions, and more.
Proposal Sponsor: Eco-Action Committee
Amend Chapter II, Social Justice, Section E, Education and the Arts,
Sub-section 1, Education by adding a new point “y.
Proposed Changes
y. Educate students in grade school and higher education with courses in the environmental sciences, with a focus on the hands-on practice of regenerative, organic, community farming/gardening, increased emphasis on energy conservation, exposure to industrialized food production through field trips and educational films (at an appropriate age), and other courses that include a comprehensive curriculum on climate change, biodiversity, and other planetary boundaries and environmental concerns. Focus on education through a general immersion in nature to understand, hands-on, the intricate dependence of humanity upon the natural world.
Proposal Sponsor: Platform Committee
A. CIVIL RIGHTS AND EQUAL RIGHTS
9. GI and Veterans’ Rights
…We further believe that the dangerous burden of fighting the unnecessary [Remove: war in Iraq, and the wars that may follow]а [Add:wars in the Middle East] … .а
6. Many of those U.S. Soldiers, Sailors, Marines and Airmen who served during U.S. Wars in [Remove: the past two] [Add: recent] decades have been exposed to nuclear, chemical and possibly biological warfare agents. The VeteranТs [Remove ‘] Administration canТt ignore their suffering since coming home from the war. The Congress should fund and the VA should implement a comprehensive program to survey Vets and the impacts of [Remove: Gulf War syndrome] [Add: their deployment] on them …аа
7. Veterans [Remove: of the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan] are being unfairly discharged from the service with [Add: post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)] and other injuries caused by stress, trauma and head injuries, under trumped-up behavioral charges, as a means of military budget cost-cutting. …
Proposal Sponsors: Minnesota Green, Green Party National Black Caucus
Amend Chapter II, Social Justice; Chapter H., Criminal Justice by adding a new subsection 5 to read:
II. Social Justice H.
CriminalJustice
5. Police Accountability
Due to current conditions when it comes to policing the cities and people, police officers are the 6th leading cause of death for young men in America. More commonly, ?the greatest lives that are at stake are those of our black, brown, LGBTQIA?+ ?and disabled, including those with mental health issues? when it comes to crimes against persons at the hands of the police. In accordance we recommend the following actions:
a. Police Require all police officers to carry professional liability insurance as a requirement to working on the police force.
b. That the insurance will act as a mechanism by which we can have officers with histories of brutality and misconduct removed from duty, thereby keeping that person from committing crimes under the protection of the police department; this functions through the insurance company, which will increase premiums and eventually determine that rogue officers are uninsurable.
c. Serve as a deterrent to officers taking actions that could result in a complaint against them, as this could cause a premium increase for the officer.
d. Prevent the taxpayer from having to foot the bill for police brutality cases, which cost taxpayers millions of dollars.
e.Establish a national database to record excessive force complaints, to be used in hiring decisions of police officers.
Chapter III – ECOLOGICAL SUSTAINABILITY
Proposal Sponsor: Eco-Action Committee
Amend Chapter III, Ecological Sustainability, Section J, Biological Diversity by adding a new point 11
Proposed Changes
11. Support an executable and enforceable international agreement that preserves existing biodiversity, and mitigates biodiversity loss during the ongoing 6th Mass Extinction, but also works to repair our fractured, shrinking biodiversity in order to ensure overall health of the biosphere using a framework similar to that of the Montreal Protocol (See Chapter III.N. for more detail).
Proposal Sponsor: Animal Rights Committee
Amend Chapter III, Ecological Sustainability, Section K. Ethical Treatment of Animals by adding a new point 11 to read:
11. Oppose captivity of cetaceans (whales, dolphins, porpoises) for entertainment and/or commercial profit. End the capture and exploitation of cetaceans for entertainment purposes in marine parks and aquariums and captive breeding programs to maintain entertainment stock. Support funding for the development of sanctuaries for cetaceans which may be transitional or permanent depending on the evaluation of the cetaceans involved.
Proposal Sponsor: Animal Rights Committee
Amend Chapter III, Ecological Sustainability, Section K. Ethical Treatment of Animals by adding a new point 12 to read:
12. Encourage a plant-based diet to reduce methane gas emissions that contribute to climate change, reduce animal suffering, reduce animal waste runoff in waterways, reduce animal consumption of grain that could feed the impoverished, and for improved health, among other reasons.
Proposal Sponsor: Eco-Action Committee
Amend Chapter III, Ecological Sustainability, Section M, Biological Diversity by adding a new point 15.
Proposed Changes
15. Support an international agreement for the full cleanup of all plastic waste currently in our oceans, with a focus on heavily polluted international waters and environmentally sensitive ecosystems in areas like the Great Pacific Garbage Patch and the Great Barrier Reef.
Proposal Sponsor: Eco-Action Committee
Amend Chapter III, Ecological Sustainability, by adding a new Section N. International Environmental Policy
Proposed new section N:
GPUS believes that an international agreement should be reached which sets (1) an executable and enforceable framework for keeping Earth well within its 7 measurable planetary boundaries (currently including climate change, biosphere integrity, land-system change, freshwater use, biogeochemical flows, ocean acidification, and stratospheric ozone depletion) (2) an executable and enforceable framework for the designation of at least 50% of the planet as a nature reserve and (3) international protections, funding, and legal personhood to large swaths of wildlands like the Brazilian Amazon and Nile River, including rivers longer than 1,500 km and wildlands larger than 1,000,000 acres.
Chapter IV – ECOLOGICAL ECONOMICS
Proposal Sponsor Banking and Monetary Reform Committee
Amend paragraphs 12 and 13 of Chapter IV, Ecological Economics, Section I. Banking and Insurance Reform to read:
12. Prosecute all financial fraud committed by criminal bankers. The Green Party calls for the aggressive investigation and prosecution of both individuals and corporate entities that engage in these criminal acts. Present laws shield corporate officers and employees from prosecution. Existing fines resulting from convictions against corporate entities do not provide an adequate deterrent to their abuse of power. Penalties for crimes against ordinary consumers should include prison terms for executives and employees, as well as fines, revocations of charters and confiscation of corporate and individual assets.
13. Home ownership represents the primary method by which many individuals accumulate wealth. If lending institutions are found to have engaged in fraudulent lending or foreclosure practices, then judicial remedies should include fines and imprisonment, as well as equitable remedies in the form of damages, refinancing, and debt forgiveness for homeowners. Laws should be strengthened to protect consumers against foreclosure on their homes by banks and other lending agencies. Strict laws should be enacted that provide swift criminal prosecution of any lending agency, including executives, employees, lawyers and other firms that assist them in fraudulent practices and fraudulent foreclosures. Laws should also be enacted to provide individual homeowners with legal assistance through publicly-funded agencies when faced with any potential financial fraud, including foreclosure.
Proposal Sponsor Banking and Monetary Reform Committee
Amend Chapter IV, Section I, Insurance and Banking by adding a new paragraph 15.
15. Public Banking – We support Public Banking consistent with the ‘Greening the Dollar’ plank – that is, that the power to create money no longer resides with banks, private or public. We support the expansion of state and municipal public banking based on the model of the Bank of North Dakota, which does not create money when it lends, but lends only funds already deposited with the bank.
Proposal Sponsor Banking and Monetary Reform Committee
Amend Platform Chapter IV, Ecological Economics, Letter M. National Debt. to read:
OUR POSITION
Greens will reduce our national debt.
Our nation is in debt because our privatized Federal Reserve monetary system only creates and issues money as debt through loans. The government must constantly borrow more money due to the shortfall in tax revenue, thus steadily increasing the national debt.
Our national debt has grown by trillions of dollars to finance tax cuts for America’s wealthiest citizens, war, corporate welfare and bailouts of Wall Street and the automotive industry. The burden of the increasing annual interest payments on the debt falls disproportionately on working people and the small business community. It is not sustainable.
GREEN SOLUTIONS
1. Reduce our national debt by increasing taxes on large corporations and polluters, eliminating loopholes for the super-rich and decreasing expenditures in some areas, especially for war, armaments and corporate welfare.
2. Pay off the national debt as it comes due when ‘Greening the Dollar’ is implemented.
Proposal Sponsor Banking and Monetary Reform Committee
Amend Chapter IV, Ecological Economics by deleting paragraphs 15, 16, and 17 of Chapter IV, Section I and creating a new Section N. to read:
N. Monetary Reform (Greening the Dollar)
A Green Public Money Future
The crisis in our financial system makes it imperative that we restructure our monetary system. The present system of privatized money issuance and control has resulted in the misdirection of our financial resources to speculation, toxic financial instruments, and loans that create huge profits and wealth for the corporate few, but inadequate income and jobs for the common people.
It is both possible and necessary for Congress to take back its exclusive Constitutional power to create our money (Article1 Section 8) without the creation of debt, and assume the responsibility to spend this money directly into circulation to fund public benefits outlined in the Federal Budget. Only with a Public Money System can the government direct our national wealth to the needs of the people through their local and state governments. A Public Money System will enable millions of good livelihoods, provide sufficient incomes, shrink the debt burden and begin to close the wealth gap. Public money has not been issued since Greenbacks, introduced by President Lincoln in 1862, and circulating as public money until 1971.
To reverse the private control of issuing our nation’s money; to reverse the immoral and undeserved concentration of national wealth and income resulting from that private control; to place control over money within a more equitable public system of governmental checks and balances; and to end the regular recurrence of severe and disruptive financial crises that mark the Booms and Busts cycles of capitalism – the Green Party proposes the following three Public Money solutions to be enacted together:
1.Nationalize the 12 Federal Reserve Banks and transfer administrative functions of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors to a Bureau of the U.S. Treasury.а All money created under the nationalized Federal Reserve System will be treated as publicly issued money. The private creation of money will cease and with it the reckless practices that have led to recurring economic crises.аа
2.All new money will be issued as a debt-free, permanently circulating asset by the federal government. A new Public Monetary Authority will be established under the Department of Treasury to scientifically determine the amount of money that can be safely created for the national economy to avoid inflation or deflation. The Monetary Authority will be empowered with full autonomy and independence to avoid political influence.а Although banks will continue as financial intermediaries, lending publicly-issued money at interest, and performing traditional banking functions they will no longer be allowed to create money, ending what is known as fractional reserve banking. Specific guidance for a progressive publicly-controlled Monetary Authority can be found in a bill already entered into the U.S. Congress: H.R. 2990 Ч 112th Congress: National Emergency Employment Defense Act of 2011 (NEED Act).
3.All new money will be spent into circulation by the U.S. Government as authorized by Congress for public purpose. This includes funding a 21st century infrastructure including education and health care. Per capita spending guidelines for new money will assure a fair distribution across the nation, creating good livelihoods, re-invigorating local economies and funding government at all levels. Newly-created money will also be distributed directly to state and local governments.