Gary Earl Johnson was born on January 1,1953 and is an American businessman, author, and politician who served as the 29th governor of New Mexico from 1995 to 2003 as a member of the Republican Party.
75 Facts About Gary Johnson
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Gary Johnson has been a member of the Libertarian Party since 2011 and was the party's nominee for President of the United States in the 2012 and 2016 elections.
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Gary Johnson was the Libertarian nominee in the 2018 US Senate election in New Mexico.
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Gary Johnson was unable to convince the state senate to pass any of his motions.
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Gary Johnson ran for president in 2012, initially as a Republican on a libertarian platform emphasizing the United States public debt and a balanced budget, protection of civil liberties, military non-interventionism, replacement of income tax with the FairTax, and opposition to the War on drugs.
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Gary Johnson received 1.3 million votes, more than all other minor candidates combined.
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Gary Johnson ran again for President in 2016, winning the Libertarian nomination and naming former Republican governor of Massachusetts Bill Weld as his running mate.
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Gary Johnson received nearly 4.5 million votes, which is the most for a third-party presidential candidate since 1996 and the highest national vote share for a Libertarian candidate in history.
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In 1971, Gary Johnson graduated from Sandia High School in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where he was on the school track team.
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Gary Johnson attended the University of New Mexico from 1971 to 1975 and graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in political science.
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When he started the business, which focused on mechanical contracting, Gary Johnson was its only employee.
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Gary Johnson eventually grew Big J into a multimillion-dollar corporation with over 1,000 employees.
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Gary Johnson entered politics in 1994 with the intention of running for governor and was advised by "Republican Elders" to run for the State Legislature instead.
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Gary Johnson's platform emphasized tax cuts, job creation, state government spending growth restraint, and law and order.
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Gary Johnson was elected in a nationally Republican year, although party registration in the state of New Mexico at the time was 2-to-1 Democratic.
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In 1998, Gary Johnson ran for reelection as governor against Democratic Albuquerque Mayor Martin Chavez.
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Gary Johnson made the promotion of a school voucher system a "hallmark issue" of his second term.
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In 1999, Gary Johnson became one of the highest-ranking elected officials in the US to advocate the legalization of marijuana.
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Gary Johnson compared attempts to enforce the nation's drug laws with the failed attempt at alcohol prohibition.
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In 2000, Gary Johnson proposed a more ambitious voucher program than he had proposed the year before, under which each parent would receive $3,500 per child for education at any private or parochial school.
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Gary Johnson's handling of the disaster earned him accolades from The Denver Post, which observed that:.
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Gary Johnson helped reporters understand where the fire was headed when low-level Forest Service officials couldn't, ran herd over the bureaucratic process of getting state and federal agencies and the National Guard involved, and even helped put out some of the fire with his feet.
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Gary Johnson jumped out and stomped on the flames, as did his wife and some of his staffers.
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Gary Johnson slashed the size of state government during his term and left the state with a large budget surplus.
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Gary Johnson insisted that the commercial was directed at "the guy who's got his gun out" rather than nonviolent drug offenders.
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Gary Johnson was term limited and could not run for a third consecutive term as governor in 2002.
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Gary Johnson serves on the Advisory Council of Students for Sensible Drug Policy, a student nonprofit organization which advocates for drug policy reform.
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In 2009, Gary Johnson began indicating interest in running for president in the 2012 election.
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In December 2009, Gary Johnson asked strategist Ron Nielson of NSON Opinion Strategy, who has worked with Gary Johnson since 1993 when he ran his successful gubernatorial campaign, to organize the Our American Initiative as a 501 committee.
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In February 2010, Gary Johnson was a featured speaker at both the Conservative Political Action Conference and the Republican Liberty Caucus.
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Gary Johnson met tons of reporters, commanded a small scrum after the vote, and is a slightly lighter shade of dark horse now.
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Gary Johnson was the first of an eventually large field to announce his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination.
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Gary Johnson again chose Ron Nielson of NSON Opinion Strategy, a director for both of his New Mexico gubernatorial campaigns, as his presidential campaign manager and senior advisor.
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Gary Johnson participated in the first of the Republican presidential debates, hosted by Fox News in South Carolina on May 5,2011, appearing on stage with Herman Cain, Ron Paul, Tim Pawlenty, and Rick Santorum.
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Gary Johnson participated, appearing on stage with Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Jon Huntsman, Ron Paul, Rick Perry, Mitt Romney, and Rick Santorum.
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Gary Johnson encouraged his supporters to vote for Ron Paul in 2012 Republican presidential primaries.
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On December 28,2011, Gary Johnson formally withdrew his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination, and declared his candidacy for the 2012 presidential nomination of the Libertarian Party in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
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On May 5,2012, at the 2012 Libertarian National Convention, Johnson received the Libertarian Party's official nomination for president in the 2012 election, by a vote of 419 votes to 152 votes for second-place candidate R Lee Wrights.
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On October 23,2012, Gary Johnson participated in a third-party debate that was aired on C-SPAN, RT America, and Al Jazeera English.
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Gary Johnson stated that his goal was to win at least 5 percent of the vote, as winning 5 percent would allow Libertarian Party candidates equal ballot access and federal funding during the next election cycle.
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Gary Johnson said that he would not rule out running as a Republican again in the future.
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In December 2013, Gary Johnson announced the founding of his own Super PAC, Our America Initiative PAC.
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In July 2014, Gary Johnson was named president and CEO of Cannabis Sativa Inc.
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In 2020, Gary Johnson joined the Libertarians for National Popular Vote's advisory board.
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In November 2014, Gary Johnson affirmed his intention to run for the 2016 Libertarian nomination.
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In January 2016, Gary Johnson resigned from his post as CEO of Cannabis Sativa, Inc.
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On January 6,2016, Gary Johnson declared that he would seek the Libertarian nomination for the presidency.
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On May 29,2016, Gary Johnson received the Libertarian nomination on the second ballot.
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On September 23, in an MSNBC interview with Kasie Hunt, Gary Johnson noted the benefits of being invited to the 2016 Presidential Debates.
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Gary Johnson was speculated to run in the 2018 US Senate race in New Mexico after Land Commissioner Aubrey Dunn Jr.
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Gary Johnson's views have been described as fiscally conservative and socially liberal with a philosophy of limited government and military non-interventionism.
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Gary Johnson spoke at the 2016 Conservative Political Action Conference, a forum for conservative politicians.
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In 1994, Gary Johnson ran for governor of New Mexico, campaigning as a strong proponent of the death penalty, but over time, he changed his opinion.
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Gary Johnson has said that he would immediately balance the federal budget, and would demand a balanced budget amendment, but maintained a state deficit.
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Gary Johnson has advocated passing a law allowing for state bankruptcy and expressly ruling out a federal bailout of any states.
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Gary Johnson has supported an audit of the central bank, and urged Members of Congress in July 2012 to vote in favor of Ron Paul's Federal Reserve Transparency Act.
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Gary Johnson has stated that he does not believe Iran is a military threat, would use his presidential power to prevent Israel from attacking Iran, and would not follow Israel, or any other ally, into a war that it had initiated.
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Gary Johnson has been a strong supporter of civil liberties and has received the highest score of any candidate from the American Civil Liberties Union for supporting drug decriminalization while opposing censorship and regulation of the Internet, the Patriot Act, enhanced airport screenings, and the indefinite detention of prisoners.
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Gary Johnson has spoken in favor of the separation of church and state, and has said that he does not "seek the counsel of God" when determining his political agenda.
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Gary Johnson has been a longtime advocate of legalizing marijuana and has said that if he were president, he would remove it from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act as well as issue an executive order pardoning nonviolent marijuana offenders.
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Gary Johnson has stated that he would pardon NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.
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Gary Johnson proposes "eliminating categories and quotas" and offering illegal immigrants without criminal records in the US a path to legal status.
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Gary Johnson advocates simplifying restrictions on temporary work visas, granting illegal immigrants who obey the law a two-year grace period to obtain work visas and streamlining the immigration process.
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Gary Johnson has said, "a work visa should include a background check and a Social Security card so that taxes get paid" and supports a one strike, you're out deportation rule for immigrants who try to circumnavigate or cheat a simplified immigration process.
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Gary Johnson believes that allowing concealed carrying of guns reduces crime and gun violence.
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Gary Johnson opposes barring gun sales to individuals on the no-fly list, because he claims that such lists have a high error rate.
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Gary Johnson was married to his college girlfriend, Dee Gary Johnson from 1977 to 2005.
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Gary Johnson initiated a separation in May 2005, and four months later announced that they would divorce.
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At the age of 54, Dee Gary Johnson died unexpectedly on December 22,2006, her cause of death later attributed to hypertensive heart disease.
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Gary Johnson has a granddaughter, Cora, through his son Erik.
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Gary Johnson competed three times as a celebrity invitee at the Ironman World Championship in Hawaii, registering his best time for the 2.4-mile swim, 112-mile bike ride, and 26.2-mile marathon run in 1999 with 10 hours, 39 minutes, and 16 seconds.
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Gary Johnson once ran 100 miles in 30 consecutive hours in the Rocky Mountains.
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On October 12,2005, Gary Johnson was involved in a near-fatal paragliding accident when his wing caught in a tree and he fell approximately 50 feet to the ground.
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Gary Johnson suffered multiple bone fractures, including a burst fracture to his twelfth thoracic vertebra, a broken rib, and a broken knee; the accident left him.
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Gary Johnson used medicinal marijuana for pain control from 2005 to 2008.