Prof. Cornel West Brings his Campaign to East New York

By Nayaba Arinde
Editor-at-Large
Prof. Cornel West chose East New York, Brooklyn, to make his New York announcement that he was running for president in 2025. It was a sunny November Saturday. Linden Park aka Sonny (Abubadika) Carson Park, was buzzing as folk came out to hear.
With his $27 minimum wage and $80,000 starting salary for teachers’ proposals, the self-proclaimed socialist Dr. West is certainly pushing a working people’s manifesto.
He said he looked around, found a void, saw “such mendacity and mediocrity,” and decided to enter the presidential race to be the “voice that keeps alive the great tradition of love warriors, and freedom fighters, and wounded healers.

“I hadn’t planned on it. Not at all. I’m 70-years-old…But the calling is still the same. We never give up on fighting for the people…now it spills over into presidential politics, same message, same words, same witness, same sacrifice, same brother.”
“Operation P.O.W.E.R. – People Organizing and Working for Empowerment and Respect – is pleased to announce our endorsement of Dr. Cornel West for president,” former Assemblywoman Inez Barron told Our Time Press. “We are in line with his emphasis on justice for the issues of health, education, environment, housing, employment, and other essential issues in underserved communities.”
Part lecturer, part political analyst, part preacher, part old-school orator, part elder rapper, mainstream media often covers Dr. West with a somewhat cynical or maybe even glib air, but the oft-times anti-populist narrative academic maintains his position in the face of the naysayers.
Our Time Press asked the early-stage presidential candidate how he was going to get people behind his campaign.
“Our first move now is ballot access,” Dr. West replied. “The vicious way in which the two-party system operates is such that they make it very difficult for third party or independent candidates to gain access to the ballot. You’ve got to pay the big money, millions of dollars; or you’ll need hundreds, and hundreds of thousands of signatures. We will have at least 17 states by February, and we hope to have at least 38 or 39 by the summer. We are heading towards 50. When we hit New York, New York, it is one of the most difficult. All of that organized greed at the top.”
Dr. West continued, “It’s the indifference that they have towards poor and working-class people in New York, and it’s partly because they know how powerful everyday people are when organized…and we come together.”

He supported the previous presidential runs of the Green Party’s Ralph Nader and Jill Stein and Bernie Sanders. Often hammered in the mainstream media on what they described as controversial stances on a variety of current affairs issues from; Wall Street, Big Pharma, climate change, to U.S. foreign policy.
To the doubters, Dr. West told Our Time Press, “I tell them to just watch. It’s not just going to be language and words. It’s going to be examples. That’s the difference we will make.”
A Harriet Tubman-like belief in self and mission accomplishment on the backs of ancestors who kept up the fight, added with consistency, hard work, and focus, is what is needed to tackle Jim and Jane Crow Jr. and “break the back of white supremacy,” the “radical democrat” Dr. West told the crowd, and Black press reporters.
The “Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud” writer, is an author of 20 books and editor of 13. In his new book Black Prophetic Power, Race Matters, and Democracy Matters, Dr. West lays out his philosophy and analysis of race and politics, Black legacy and leadership, the history and impact of racism, systematic oppression, and economic subjugation.
He is probably the only presidential candidate who can cite features on the albums of Bootsy Collins, Raheem Devaughn, and Terence Blanchard, and his brother, Clifton West.
Even more random for a presidential candidate is the fact that Dr. West has appeared in two Matrix films as Counselor West.
The Tulsa, Oklahoma-born “prominent and provocative democratic intellectual” is enjoying the ride, he told the Our Time Press. “I’m having a good time. You’ve got to have joy,”
Philosophy is what Dr. West has studied, and teaches, and has done so at Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and other educational institutions around the world. In between campaigning in Spring 2024, Dr. West is scheduled to “deliver the historic Gifford lectures” at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, according to his website.
A cancer survivor, he has been married four times, with two children. His wife is the Iran-born Dr. Annahita Mahdavi West, a fellow psychologist and professor.
And to the young people who may feel disenfranchised, and ignored by electoral politics, Dr. West told Our Time Press, “I tell the young people that they have to realize that they come from a great people, and they shouldn’t allow their despair to paralyze them. Their grandmothers and grandfathers may have wrestled with despair, but they did not allow despair to have the last word. They kept loving and they kept fighting.”
Asked how young adults respond to him, the man who has three albums with a host of popular artists including Jill Scott, Prince, and Andre 3000, replied; “Wonderful! I go grab them. I go where they dance, to sports, to barber shops. You’ve got to go where they are. [They listen] because they are hungry and thirsty for the real thing. They are tired of the superficial.”
After the rousing press conference, former Brooklyn Democratic Assemblywoman Inez Barron told Our Time Press, “Dr. Cornel West’s fresh platform and his integrity, are just exciting factors that appeal to those 40% of eligible and registered voters in the nation, that do not exercise their right to vote. The people are looking for something different that they can see hope in on the national stage.”

Publisher’s Note: Cornel West is Making a Mistake.

Dr. Cornel West’s campaign for president may be well-meaning, but it is counterproductive. The issues he raises about the Black community are real, and keeping them at the forefront is good. It is how they are used that is important. Using the issues that affect Black America as reasons to potentially siphon votes or reduce turnout in an election that could hinge on a razor-thin margin and will determine the course of the nation is irresponsible and dangerous.
African Americans live in two worlds. We are the heirs of those held in chattel slavery, which is reflected in the issues West speaks about, and also citizens in the American democratic republic. As such, we can make demands and hold rallies and marches to address America’s history. Based on what he has said, that will not be possible if Donald Trump wins. Demands will be useless and could get you arrested, and rallies and marches could also get you arrested, deported, or killed. He has called us “vermin.” The man is a threat to our way of life.
It would be better for Dr. West and his supporters to be, as my wife Bernice likes to say, “solution-driven” and, while continuing to push the same issues, bring the message that if those issues are of concern, then all in the sound of his voice and everyone they know, particularly in swing states, needs to come out and vote for the Democratic ticket.
Rather than waste the energy and passion of good people in a demoralizing, destructive campaign to nowhere, let them be participants in keeping us out of a dictator’s hands. Then, we take that success and use the political power that will be gained to argue, demand, and continue to push and prod the nation toward an equitable society.
The issues West raises are real. It is the candidacy that is a mistake.
David Mark Greaves