Many might regard Santa Claus running for office as a joke but he has an incredible public service record
A man bearing the resemblance as well as name of Santa Claus is running for the United States House of Representatives from the state of Alaska. The man who changed his name legally to Santa Claus many years ago plans to run against many political heavyweights in the state. According to Fox9 he has also said that he planned to not invest more than $400 (Rs.30,600) in his campaign, calling the huge amounts of money raised for political campaign as “ridiculous”.
While many might think that Santa Claus running for office might just be a practical joke, he hosts an incredible record of public service before this. According to Fox9 at one point he was the special assistant deputy police commissioner for New York City and has also volunteered for 30 different non-profit organisations.
After growing his beard, and volunteering as Santa Claus, he said he decided to change his name legally after hearing a child in a car yell to him “Santa! I love you!” He even moved to North Pole, Alaska because he thought it was more fitting for someone named Santa to reside there.
As someone who is running for office he posted on his Twitter account his political leanings and agenda. He wrote, “I'm happy to announce that I'm a Candidate in the Special Election for the U.S. House of Representatives for Alaska in 2022! I'm an independent, progressive, democratic socialist, with an affinity for Bernie Sanders, and aim to represent ALL Alaskans”.
Speaking to FOX TV Station on April 22, he said in his interview "A lot of my platform resembles Bernie's, but rather than add 20 pages to my website SantaClausForAlaska.com, I just refer people to Berniesanders.com/issues if they're really interested."
He is running for Alaska's lone seat in the US House of Representatives after the death of Republican Don Young, who had represented the state since 1973.