In February, Kelcey Wilson announced in his blog that he was running for president of the United States, but no one read the posting.
Most candidates would be upset by such a thud. Not Wilson.
"I intentionally didn't publicize it," he said. "I wanted to be working in the background."
For the past month, with his laptop and a stack of bumper stickers, Wilson has been campaigning for president in front of McKeldin Library. He appears an unlikely, if not contradictory, contender.
He has raised no money and has no campaign staff; he described his place of residence as "mobile" and admitted the campaign could make him a "butt of jokes."
"I don't even want a political career," he wrote in an e-mail.
Wilson, 38, is running for the nomination of Unity08, a recently founded non-profit group. He said he decided to run for president last fall, when efforts to start a social commentary magazine in Los Angeles fell through.
"I started brainstorming how to accomplish the goals I wanted to accomplish with the magazine," he said.
One goal included showing how "the system, for lack of a better word, allows bad things to happen, I guess."
Wilson needs 2,500 registered voters to sign his petition and 20,000 more online to be the Unity nominee.
He had zero online signatures last night and a third of his 250 hard-copy signatures came from the Maryland campus, he said. The rest were obtained while sitting in Washington Square Park in New York and Harvard Square in Cambridge, Mass.
Students at this university had mixed reactions to the campaign.
"You get that first reaction of 'You're joking,' or, 'This isn't serious,'" Wilson said. "Then people hear about my platform and they really like it."
The platform includes apologizing to Iraqis for the Iraq war, universal Internet access and transparency of government.
Raised in Southern California, Wilson has spent a lifetime changing jobs and transferring schools, working at a magazine, a start-up toy company and a software firm. He dropped out of Lehigh University to join the Navy, attended junior college, and earned a philosophy degree from Boston College. He is now studying for a liberal arts master's degree from San Diego State University.
Wilson said his political experience consists of volunteering for retired Gen. Wesley Clark and Sen. John Kerry's failed presidential bids in 2004.
After announcing his candidacy, Wilson bumped into childhood friend Dominic Crapuchettes at a school reunion in Southern California. Crapuchettes, a Greenbelt resident, offered Wilson a place to stay if he campaigned in the Washington area. Wilson took him up on the offer, and this month he spent roughly a week in Crapuchettes' spare bedroom, rent-free.
Unity08 co-founder Doug Bailey said there are six confirmed candidates running for the Unity nomination, including Wilson. According to the Federal Election Commission, there are 115 candidates nationwide registered for the presidential race.
"Is it possible that an unknown can come out of nowhere and do it?" asked Bailey. "Absolutely."
Wilson said he remains optimistic. On Thursday he will fly home to California to build a campaign team, and while he hasn't raised a dollar, money isn't an issue. Wilson said he inherited $200,000 last year and is willing to spend $50,000 before he throws in the towel.
Wilson, who will return to the campus in December, dismissed the notion that he faces impossible odds, insisting the campaign is something he has to do.
"[It's] to everybody's advantage if I can prevent people from jumping to the conclusion that I'm somehow out of my mind," Wilson wrote in an e-mail. "I'm not so concerned about people mocking it for its improbability so long as they at least appreciate my personal justification for running as distinct from my political motivations."
newsdesk@dbk.umd.edu
Be the first to comment on this article!
Log in to be able to post comments.