59 Green Party candidates elected in US elections

The Green Party of the United States made major gains in Tuesday's US elections, with 59 Green candidates elected to public office across all ends of the country - including the new mayor of Richmond, California.

Other highlights included:

• Rich Whitney received 11% in his run for Illinois Governor (despite incumbant Gov. Rod Blagojevich spending $800,000 in taxpayers' money trying to keep Greens off the state ballot).
  
• Pat LaMarche, running on a strong universal health care platform, drew nearly 10% in her campaign for Governor of Maine.
  
• Joyce Robinson-Paul received 14,109 votes for 14.7% (second place) in her race for D.C.'s U.S. Senate seat.
  
• Green candidate Tom Kelly, running for the U.S. House in Colorado's District 1, received 25,096 votes for 21%.
  
• Also in California, incumbent City Council member Larry Robinson was reelected in Sebastopol, retaining the Council's Green majority, in place since 2000.
  
• The Massachusetts Green-Rainbow Party needed 3% in a statewide vote to maintain ballot status. Dr. Jill Stein, running for Secretary of the Commonwealth, accomplished this by receiving 351,495 votes (the most votes for any Green candidate on November 7) for 18% in a two way race. Jamie O'Keefe, running for State Treasure, also had a high enough vote percentage to accomplish this. He received 16% (322,493 votes).
  
• 8.7 million voters across the U.S. voted for withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq and for impeachment resolutions on local and state ballots that were promoted or supported by Greens. Troop withdrawal initiatives won in all ten localities in Wisconsin, including Milwaukee, and all 11 communities in Illinois, including Chicago. Of 139 cities and towns in Massachusetts voting on the troop withdrawal measures, only a handful voted nay on initiatives demanding that Congress and the White House end the war immediately. In California, San Francisco voters supported a local impeachment measure by 59.41%. In Berkeley, a similar resolution won the support of 68.56% of the electorate.

A geographical breakdown of all elected Greens is as follows:

• California - 20 elected
  
• Wisconsin - 11 elected
  
• District of Columbia - 8 elected
  
• Maine - 4 elected
  
• Colorado - 3 elected
  
• Massachusetts - 3 elected
  
• Oregon - 3 elected
  
• Alaska - 1 elected
  
• Arizona - 1 elected
  
• Florida - 1 elected
  
• Hawai'i - 1 elected
  
• Nebraska - 1 elected
  
• New York - 1 elected
  
• Minnesota - 1 elected

Read more here.