New Haven Independent

This Manchester Community College English teacher (and formidable Independent typo-catcher) is angry, and he’s not a “candy-coater.” He’s making a run for it in Connecticut’s Third Congressional District against incumbent Democrat Rosa DeLauro because it “makes me sick that DeLauro has been in office 16 years.” That long in power is the road to “abuse,” Sumrall said — suggesting the road was paved, in DeLauro’s case, in $200,000 of special interest money accepted this election cycle. “Wealth concentrated into the hands of the few is monstrous, and undemocratic,” declared the poet-turned-politician, for whom economic fairness and campaign finance reform are key running issues.

Sumrall became the backed candidate to try and change all that — and more — at an intimate Green Party convention at the First Unitarian Universalist Society of New Haven on Whitney Avenue Wednesday night. With a choice between Sumrall or None of the Above, the nine Third District voters in attendance went unanimously for Sumrall — leaving a “verifiable paper trail” of their endorsement on environmentally conscious-sized scraps of notebook page.

“I’m excited to be a Green,” celebrated party co-chair Charlie Pillsbury (pictured in the corner at the top of this story), at the official result. “I’m delighted to have people of his stature” running for the party, Pillsbury added, hailing Sumrall a “great articulator of Green issues.”

Before getting his party’s green light, the candidate took the opportunity to demonstrate. “Charlie won it, Ralph maintained it, I’m keeping it going!” he trumpeted at the podium, proffering shout-outs to two past Greens to make it onto the state congressional ballot alongside DeLauro: Pillsbury in 2002 and Ralph Ferrucci in 2004. “The Greens will be there whether they like us or not. Lamont will lose the [Democratic] primary [for U.S. Senate, against Joe Lieberman] — but we’ll be on the ballot.”

That’s important. “Most people who are Democrats in New Haven are Democrats because they’re not Republicans. That’s no way to choose a party.” Fed up with a one-party town’s pretenses of democracy, Sumrall’s taking his 29-year-old energy out door-knocking to give people a choice — a principle-driven attack on the Democratic Party machine. Which Sumrall thinks, by the way, will make the “smoky backroom” call to stick with its old friend Joe, and “roll right over Ned Lamont.” Anyway, “Ralph [Ferrucci, the Greens’ candidate] is better than both of them.”

But enough about Dems. “This is a historic event,” said Clifford Thornton, the Green Party’s gubernatorial candidate (pictured at left, with Green candidate for secretary of state Mike DeRosa). “This is the first time a third party is running a full slate of candidates. We’re actually having a democratic process.”

“I hope I can do my party proud,” said Sumrall, who will kick off signature-seeking in earnest now that he’s endorsed.

Other key issues for Sumrall are immigration — “I’m staunchly pro-citizenship: Those who are anti-citizenship want an exclusive club, mostly for just white people” — and universal healthcare, a public good for which the government is responsible. How to pay for it? That’s simple, said Sumrall. “Cut the $513 billion defense budget. We don’t need that much money to hunt people out of caves.” Sumrall would know a “growing culture of militarism in America” when he saw one: both father and mother are career military, and his sister just got back from a tour in Iraq.

“I’m the black sheep in my family because I went to college and have so far resisted the urge to pick up an M-16,” he said acidly.

Also, we should take ethanol fuel seriously. And yes, Sumrall would introduce articles of presidential impeachment.