{news} Green Party's Hatch to Take on Sen. Hatch

[David Bedell]

(I thought this was a clever gimmick.  Find a Green with the same last name 
to run against the incumbent, and you're sure to get some media attention.  
Not to mention getting votes from confused voters.)


Green Party's Hatch to Take on Sen. Hatch

The Associated Press
Friday, November 11, 2005; 10:01 PM

SALT LAKE CITY -- Five-term incumbent Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, will face a 
challenge from a distant member of his own family, Green Party candidate 
Julian Hatch, in the November 2006 election.

The Green Party of Utah announced Friday that the 51-year-old environmental 
activist and disabled veteran accepted the party's nomination at a 
convention this week.

"I am opposing my own relative so citizens of Utah will finally have a real 
choice since Democrats have adopted so many Republican policy positions in 
recent years," said Hatch, a lifelong Utah resident. He works as the state's 
coordinator for the Western Watersheds Project, a public lands policy group 
based in Hailey, Idaho.

Julian Hatch opposes the war in Iraq and will also campaign for abortion 
rights, affordable health care, tax reform and public land protection.

"We are building a populist third party to challenge the ruling two-party 
system that has become immersed in big money and entrenched in fascist 
ideology," he said.