[WestMALocals] Fwd: PUBLIC INTEREST ATTORNEY EXPLORING SECRETARY OF STATE BID

[Nat Fortune]

Last year, Bonifaz was lead counsel for the Green and Libertarian 
parties in Ohio, trying to force a recount of presidential election 
votes. He also acted as lead counsel in the Massachusetts battle 
between activists who helped pass a public campaign financing ballot 
law and the state Legislature, which refused to fund the law and 
ultimately repealed it.

Begin forwarded message:

>
> PUBLIC INTEREST ATTORNEY EXPLORING SECRETARY OF STATE BID
>
> By Jim O’Sullivan
> STATE HOUSE NEWS SERVICE
>
> STATE HOUSE, BOSTON, AUG. 29, 2005….John C. Bonifaz, one of the 
> nation’s top public interest attorneys, is probing a bid for secretary 
> of state in Massachusetts next year, declaring his intention to 
> “return government to the people.”
>
> The Jamaica Plain advocate and author formed a campaign committee with 
> the state Office of Campaign and Political Finance last week.  In a 
> recent interview, Bonifaz said that he would definitely run if 
> Secretary of State William Galvin decides to seek the Democratic 
> gubernatorial nomination, and may run if Galvin seeks re-election.
>
> “I should be clear that what I’m doing here is I’m exploring a run,” 
> Bonifaz, a Democrat, said during a telephone interview. “I have not 
> closed the door on the possibility of a run if Secretary Galvin 
> decides to run for re-election.”
>
> Bonifaz called for Galvin to arrive at a decision. “I think if he 
> really wants to run for governor, and that’s really what he wants to 
> be doing, then he should run for governor,” Bonifaz said.
>
> The contours of the Secretary of State’s race rely heavily on those of 
> the ballot’s marquee contest.
> Attorney General Thomas F. Reilly and former Justice Department lawyer 
> Deval Patrick are running for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination. 
>  Galvin has indicated he is considering a run for governor, but might 
> also seek a fourth term, a spokesman said Friday.
>
> “He’s looking at governor, he’s exploring that, but no decisions,” 
> Brian McNiff said. Through McNiff, Galvin declined comment on 
> Bonifaz’s candidacy.
>
> If elected, Bonifaz said, he would push for public financing of 
> elections, same-day voter registration, and other measures, in an 
> effort to turn the Bay State into “a model for free and fair elections 
> for the rest of the country.”
> His would be “a grassroots, outsider candidacy if it’s launched,” 
> Bonifaz said.
>
> Cameron Kerry, the brother of U.S. Sen. John Kerry, said publicly last 
> month that he would vie for the post if Galvin runs for governor.
> A Harvard Law School alumnus and former campaign scheduler for Sen. 
> Edward M. Kennedy, Bonifaz has been at the center of several 
> high-profile election law fights, both nationally and at the state 
> level, during the past decade. A former staff attorney at the Center 
> for Responsive Politics, he founded the National Voting Rights 
> Institute in 1994 and was its executive director until 2004, when he 
> stepped down to serve as general counsel.
> Last year, Bonifaz was lead counsel for the Green and Libertarian 
> parties in Ohio, trying to force a recount of presidential election 
> votes. He also acted as lead counsel in the Massachusetts battle 
> between activists who helped pass a public campaign financing ballot 
> law and the state Legislature, which refused to fund the law and 
> ultimately repealed it.
>
> In 2003, Bonifaz led a legal effort to block the invasion of Iraq by 
> seeking a restraining order against the Bush Administration to prevent 
> it from waging war on the grounds that Congress had not declared war. 
> That same year, he wrote Warrior King: The Case for Impeaching George 
> Bush, which argued that preemptive war on Iraq represented a betrayal 
> of the constitutional framers’ desire to move away from the military 
> autonomy of European monarchs.
>
> As a student at Harvard Law in 1990, Bonifaz was a named plaintiff in 
> a suit against the institution charging it discriminated against women 
> and minority candidates when hiring for tenure-track positions. A 
> state court denied the plaintiffs standing because they had not been 
> directly harmed by the policy, Bonifaz said Friday.
>
> A native of Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, Bonifaz said he has lived in 
> Massachusetts “almost consistently” since coming here in 1988 to work 
> on Kennedy’s re-election campaign. He has never run for office before, 
> he said, but mulled a 2002 bid, as an independent candidate, against 
> John Kerry for Senate.
>
> Cameron Kerry was not available for comment.
>
> -END -
>
>
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