Ralph Nader joins White House race

Standing as a Green party candidate that year, Nader took some 97,000 votes in Florida.

 

His candidacy provoked claims that he had siphoned off support from Al Gore, the former vice-president, in that key state.

 

Four years later, Nader won just 0.3 per cent of the national vote as an independent when he appeared on the presidential ballot in only 34 states.

 

 

Nader said in Sunday’s interview that he would offer different perspectives on issues such as the environment, workplace safety and corporate interests.

 

He called John McCain, the leading Republican candidate for the nomination, “the candidate for perpetual war”.

 

He also criticised Barack Obama, the current Democratic frontrunner, saying that his “better instincts and his knowledge have been censored by himself”.

 

Obama, an Illinois senator, is attempting to defeat rival Hillary Clinton in contests in Ohio and Texas on March 4.

 

Anybody had the right to run for president if they qualified, he said on Saturday.

 

 

Obama said: “I think the job of the Democratic Party is to be so compelling that a few percentage of the vote going to another candidate is not going to make any difference.”

 

But a website campaigner for him was hostile to Nader’s decision to run in November.