With minutes to go before the filing deadline, Ferguson activist DeRay Mckesson has announced that he will run for mayor of Baltimore.
The Baltimore Sun reports that Mckesson, a Baltimore native, is the 13th candidate to join the mayoral race. His bid comes just more than two months before the Baltimore primary elections.
VIDEO: DeRay McKesson and Johnetta Elzie Discuss Protesting in Baltimore and Ferguson
“It is true that I am a non-traditional candidate—I am not a former Mayor, City Councilman, state legislator, philanthropist or the son of a well-connected family,” he wrote in an essay on Medium. I am an activist, organizer, former teacher and district administrator that intimately understands how interwoven our challenges and our solutions are. I am a son of Baltimore.”
He writes in his post that growing up in Baltimore, he has seen many of the issues plaguing the city’s streets, but he knows that the city has potential.
“I understand that issues of safety are more expansive than policing, and that to make the city as safe as we want it to be, we will have to address issues related to job development, job access, grade-level reading, transportation and college readiness, amongst others,” he wrote.
Baltimore City Councilman Nick Mosby Announces Mayoral Bid
Though Democratic frontrunner Sheila Dixon has expressed doubt toward the success of Mckesson’s campaign, city councilman and democratic candidate Nick Mosby, the husband of state’s attorney Marilyn Mosby, invited Mckesson into the race.
“I welcome anyone to the race and look forward to the discussion about building a better Baltimore,” Rawlings-Blake told the Sun.