Jill Stein

Jill Stein (born May 14, 1950, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.) is a former practicing physician and an environmental activist who has run as the candidate of the Green Party of the United States in multiple elections. She was the Green Party’s 2024 presidential nominee.

Early life and education

Born to Russian Jewish parents and raised in the Reform Judaism movement, Stein grew up and completed her early education in Highland Park, Illinois, a northern suburb of Chicago. In 1973 she graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University with a bachelor’s degree in psychology, sociology, and anthropology, and in 1979 she graduated from Harvard Medical School, where she later served as an instructor in internal medicine. In addition, she practiced medicine at health clinics in the Boston area for some 25 years.

Environmental and political activism

As a physician, Stein became concerned with the connection between several of her patients’ health problems and their exposure to toxic substances in their local environments. She began work as an environmental health advocate in the late 1990s by conducting related medical and scientific research and by supporting nonprofit groups protesting environmental injustice (the inequitable distribution of environmental hazards among poor and minority communities). In addition, she joined campaigns to ban toxic pesticides, to close a medical waste incinerator in Lawrence, Massachusetts, and to reduce the massive air pollution produced by a set of coal-fired power plants in the state known as the “Filthy Five.”

Discover the fascinating events that shaped the world, straight from our editors.

SIGN UP

By clicking “Sign Up”, you consent to the Britannica Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

Stein coauthored an influential scientific report, In Harm’s Way: Toxic Threats to Child Development (2000), which summarized research into the connection between serious developmental disabilities and children’s exposure to commonly encountered household and environmental chemicals, including lead, mercury, and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). In a later book, Environmental Threats to Healthy Aging: With a Closer Look at Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s Diseases (2008), Stein and her coauthors demonstrated how exposure to environmental toxins, in combination with other environmental and social factors, can contribute to the causation and exacerbation of degenerative brain diseases affecting older people.

Stein also became a public advocate of campaign finance reform, which she viewed as necessary to limit the political influence of large corporations and thereby advance environmental justice and protect workers’ rights. In 1998 Stein’s efforts resulted in Massachusetts’s adoption of a “clean elections law” by voter referendum. Although the measure, which provided public funding for political candidates who agreed not to accept large private donations, was approved by a large margin, it was never fully financed, and in 2003 the Democratic-controlled state legislature repealed it in an unrecorded voice vote.

Elections

In a decision reflecting her disappointment with the Massachusetts Democratic Party, Stein joined the state’s Green-Rainbow Party and ran for governor as the party’s nominee in 2002. She finished in a very distant third place, with 3.4 percent of the vote, behind Republican Mitt Romney (49.2 percent) and Democrat Shannon O’Brien (44.4 percent). In 2004 she ran for a seat in the state House of Representatives and finished second, with 21 percent of the vote—well behind the Democratic candidate (60 percent) but ahead of the Republican candidate (19 percent). In 2005 she was elected to a local town council, the Lexington Town Meeting. Reelected in 2008, she cut short her second term to run again for governor, in 2010. She was less successful in that election than she had been before, gaining only 1.42 percent of the vote. Undeterred, she made a bid to become president of the United States in 2012 as the candidate of the national Green Party. Although she finished in fourth place, with only 0.4 percent of the vote, the number of votes she received, nearly 470,000, was then the largest won by any female presidential candidate in U.S. history. Stein again ran for president as the Green Party candidate in the U.S. presidential election of 2016, again finishing fourth but this time with more than 1.4 million votes.

In 2023 Stein announced her intention to run for president as the Green Party candidate in the U.S. presidential election of 2024, in which she was opposed by incumbent Democratic Vice Pres. Kamala Harris and former Republican president Donald Trump. Her announcement immediately raised concern among Democratic Party leaders, who feared that her candidacy could reduce support among Democrats, environmentalists, and progressives in certain swing states, thereby increasing the likelihood of a Trump victory in the general election. Trump himself acknowledged as much, naming Stein as one of his “favorite politicians” at a rally.

Explore Britannica Premium!

The trusted destination for professionals, college students, and lifelong learners.

SUBSCRIBE

Some critics of Stein’s recurring presidential campaigns argued that the participation of Green Party or other progressive candidates in close state or national elections (i.e., those in which popular support for the Democratic and Republican candidates is approximately the same) effectively benefits Republicans and may ultimately empower active opponents of environmental reform and other progressive causes. Frequently cited examples of such scenarios were Ralph Nader’s participation as the Green Party candidate in the U.S. presidential election of 2000, in which Republican George W. Bush defeated Democrat Al Gore, and Stein’s own candidacy in the U.S. presidential election of 2016, in which Trump defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton. In the event, Stein’s presence on the ballot in 2024 did little to affect the final result. Even in states such as Michigan, where Stein performed comparatively well, Trump’s margin of victory over Harris exceeded Stein’s vote totals.

Platform and political stances

Stein’s presidential campaigns have been based on a platform known as the Green New Deal. Evoking the political and economic reforms enacted under the New Deal program of the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration (1933–45), the Green New Deal promoted by Stein calls for the creation of millions of living-wage jobs, the transition to an environmentally sustainable economy based on renewable energy sources, free public education and government-financed health insurance (“Medicare for all”), and effective campaign finance reform, among other goals. In addition to her strong stances on energy and the environment, Stein supports a variety of other causes, including strict gun control, strengthened protections of voting rights, and “a welcoming path to citizenship for immigrants.” Stein is also a strong supporter of the rights of LGBTQ persons.

Stein is married to Richard Rohrer—who is also a physician—and has two adult sons, Ben and Noah.