John McConnell Wolfe Jr. (born April 21, 1954) is an American
attorney and
perennial political candidate. He challenged
President
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* President (education), a leader of a college or university
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Automobiles
* Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ...
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, Obama was the first Af ...
for the
Democratic Party's
2012 presidential nomination. He ultimately emerged as the most successful challenger, receiving the second-highest number of delegates (23) and popular votes (116,639).
Political campaigns
Wolfe made an unsuccessful bid in
1998 for the Democratic congressional nomination in
Tennessee's 3rd district.
[ In 2001, he ran for Mayor of Chattanooga, Tennessee, and received 2.8% of the vote in that race, which was won by ]Bob Corker
Robert Phillips Corker Jr. (born August 24, 1952) is an American businessman and politician who served as a United States Senator from Tennessee from 2007 to 2019. A member of the Republican Party, he served as Chair of the Senate Foreign Rel ...
.[ In ]2002
File:2002 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 2002 Winter Olympics are held in Salt Lake City; Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and her daughter Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon die; East Timor gains East Timor independence, indepe ...
, he lost a second congressional bid in the 3rd District to then- U.S. Representative Zach Wamp, and garnered 34% of the vote as the Democratic nominee.[ Wolfe faced Wamp again in a 2004 congressional rematch,] and was again defeated, this time acquiring 33% of the vote.[ In 2007, he ran unsuccessfully in a special election for a ]Tennessee State Senate
The Tennessee Senate is the upper house of the U.S. state of Tennessee's state legislature, which is known formally as the Tennessee General Assembly.
The Tennessee Senate has the power to pass resolutions concerning essentially any issue reg ...
seat.[
Wolfe was fined $10,000 in 2008 after he failed to file a fourth-quarter campaign finance disclosure report for his 2007 State Senate campaign with the state as required by law.][ In ]2010
File:2010 Events Collage New.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2010 Chile earthquake was one of the strongest recorded in history; The Eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland disrupts air travel in Europe; A scene from the opening ceremony of ...
, he ran for Congress in Tennessee's 3rd district, and lost to Chuck Fleischmann
Charles Joseph Fleischmann (; born October 11, 1962) is an American attorney and politician who has been the U.S. representative for since 2011. The district is based in Chattanooga and includes a large part of East Tennessee, including Oak R ...
57%-28%.
Wolfe has also made two runs for the Democratic presidential primaries, in 2012 and in 2016.
Congressional campaigns
1998 congressional campaign
In 1998 Wolfe ran, unsuccessfully, in the Democratic primary for Tennessee's 3rd congressional district
The 3rd congressional district of Tennessee is a congressional district in East Tennessee. It has been represented by Republican Chuck Fleischmann since January 2011.
Current boundaries
The district comprises two halves, joined together through ...
.
2002 congressional campaign
In the 2002 race for Tennessee's 3rd district, Wolfe was the Democratic challenger to incumbent Republican Zach Wamp. Wolfe ultimately lost to Wamp.
Below is the result of the general election
2004 congressional campaign
In 2004 Wolfe again was nominated to run against Wamp for Tennessee's 3rd congressional district.[ Wolfe lost again. Wolfe, however, was able to garner a greater number of votes but a smaller percent of the vote in 2004 than he had in 2002.
Below is the result of the general election
]
=Campaign finances
=
Detailed below are the FEC-filed finances of his 2004 congressional campaign committee as of 12/31/2008[
]
2010 congressional campaign
In 2010 Wolfe again ran for Congress in Tennessee's 3rd congressional district
The 3rd congressional district of Tennessee is a congressional district in East Tennessee. It has been represented by Republican Chuck Fleischmann since January 2011.
Current boundaries
The district comprises two halves, joined together through ...
. He ultimately lost to Chuck Fleischmann
Charles Joseph Fleischmann (; born October 11, 1962) is an American attorney and politician who has been the U.S. representative for since 2011. The district is based in Chattanooga and includes a large part of East Tennessee, including Oak R ...
57% to 28%.
Wolfe faced three other candidates for the Democratic nomination. The three other candidates on the August 2010 Democratic primary ballots were Alicia Mitchel of Oak Ridge, Brenda Freeman Short of East Ridge, and Brent Staton of Chattanooga. Several candidates had dropped-out ahead of the primary, including Tom Humphrey, Paula Flowers of Oak Ridge (a former member of Governor Phil Bredesen's cabinet), and Brent Benedict (who was the 2006 Democratic nominee for the 3rd district).
Below is the result of the general election:
Presidential campaigns
2012 presidential campaign
=Platform
=
Wolfe supports a return to the Glass-Steagall Act to separate speculative activity from commercial banking. He favors the use of Anti-Trust Laws to reduce the size of "megabanks," and proposes a tax on financial derivatives
In finance, a derivative is a contract that ''derives'' its value from the performance of an underlying entity. This underlying entity can be an asset, index, or interest rate, and is often simply called the "underlying". Derivatives can be u ...
. He also proposes an "Alternate Federal Reserve" which would loan to community banks, small business, and individuals, as opposed to the Federal Reserve Bank
A Federal Reserve Bank is a regional bank of the Federal Reserve System, the central banking system of the United States. There are twelve in total, one for each of the twelve Federal Reserve Districts that were created by the Federal Reserve ...
, which, Wolfe contends, serves primarily the interests of the six largest banks. Wolfe is also a critic of the Affordable Care Act
The Affordable Care Act (ACA), formally known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and colloquially known as Obamacare, is a landmark U.S. federal statute enacted by the 111th United States Congress and signed into law by Pres ...
, saying that it is oriented primarily toward helping the insurance and pharmaceutical companies. Instead, he supports Medicare for All
Single-payer healthcare is a type of universal healthcare in which the costs of essential healthcare for all residents are covered by a single public system (hence "single-payer").
Single-payer systems may contract for healthcare services from ...
.
=Reception
=
Wolfe took part in the New Hampshire
New Hampshire is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec t ...
"lesser known candidates forum" in December 2011. He qualified for the ballot in the New Hampshire Democratic primary
The New Hampshire presidential primary is the first in a series of nationwide party primary elections and the second party contest (the first being the Iowa caucuses) held in the United States every four years as part of the process of choosi ...
, in which he received 246 votes, 0.4% of the vote total. In addition to New Hampshire,[ he qualified for presidential primary ballots in the states of ]Missouri
Missouri is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee): Iowa to the north, Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee to the east, Arkansas t ...
, Louisiana
Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is bord ...
and Arkansas
Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the O ...
.
In the Louisiana primary
The "Louisiana primary" is the common term for top-two runoff voting system where all candidates for the same office appear together on the ballot in the general election, and if none win a simple majority, a runoff or second round election f ...
, Wolfe polled 11.83% which qualified him to earn a minimum of three delegates to the 2012 Democratic National Convention
The 2012 Democratic National Convention was a gathering, held from September 3–6, 2012, at the Time Warner Cable Arena in Charlotte, North Carolina, in which delegates of the Democratic Party nominated President Barack Obama and Vice Presi ...
.[ Following the primary, officials of the Democratic Party of Louisiana announced that Wolfe was ineligible for the delegates he had apparently won because, according to the party officials, Wolfe had not properly complied with the party's qualification requirements.] In response, Wolfe filed a lawsuit against the party, disputing the claim that he did not qualify to receive the delegates.
Following incumbent President Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, Obama was the first Af ...
's narrower-than-expected primary win in West Virginia
West Virginia is a state in the Appalachian, Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States.The Census Bureau and the Association of American Geographers classify West Virginia as part of the Southern United States while the ...
, where convicted felon Keith Russell Judd finished a strong second as a protest vote, press began to speculate on the possibility of Wolfe, who lacks Judd's criminal record, possibly contending and even winning the state of Arkansas. A poll conducted by Hendrix College of Democrats in Arkansas's 4th congressional district showed Wolfe within seven points of Obama there. Wolfe finished second in that primary, garnering 41.6% of the vote. He filed a legal action to have delegates seated at the 2012 Democratic National Convention
The 2012 Democratic National Convention was a gathering, held from September 3–6, 2012, at the Time Warner Cable Arena in Charlotte, North Carolina, in which delegates of the Democratic Party nominated President Barack Obama and Vice Presi ...
.[Candidate who won 42 percent in Arkansas Democratic primary sues for his delegates]
. ''Fox News''. Retrieved May 26, 2012.
Wolfe contested the Texas Democratic primary, garnering 5.05 percent of the vote, winning one county ( Borden County) and tying in another ( Sherman County). No delegates were at stake in the contest.
Wolfe lost his court case one week before the convention, and as a result, neither he nor any other candidates other than Obama had their delegates seated.
After Wolfe lost the primary, his name appeared on the ballot in Idaho
Idaho ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Monta ...
without his knowledge, Despite this, he did not attain any votes
Below is a table of the results of primary competitions he competed in during the Democratic primaries.
2016 presidential campaign
In November 2015, Wolfe filed for the Arkansas presidential primary.
Below is a table of the results of primary competitions he competed in during the Democratic primaries.
Senate campaign
John Wolfe also announced a run for the United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States.
The composition and po ...
representing Tennessee
Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the List of U.S. states and territories by area, 36th-largest by ...
on a platform of universal healthcare, increasing the minimum wage, the protection and expansion of social security and withdrawing from Syria
Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...
. He was interviewed on two ''E Pluribus Unum's Fireside Chats'', a Political podcast
Political podcasts are podcasts that focus on contemporary politics and current events. Most political podcasts maintain a connection with an existing media source such as a newspaper or magazine. They aim to inform or entertain or advocate a c ...
run by the YouTube
YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...
Channel ''E Pluribus Unum''[Archived a]
Ghostarchive
and th
Wayback Machine
Results
Personal life
Wolfe resides in Chattanooga, Tennessee
Chattanooga ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Hamilton County, Tennessee, United States. Located along the Tennessee River bordering Georgia, it also extends into Marion County on its western end. With a population of 181,099 in 2020 ...
.[
]
References
External links
John Wolfe for America
official 2012 campaign site
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wolfe, John Jr
Living people
Politicians from Chattanooga, Tennessee
Tennessee Democrats
Tennessee lawyers
Candidates in the 2012 United States presidential election
21st-century American politicians
Candidates in the 2016 United States presidential election
Candidates in the 2018 United States Senate elections
1954 births