On Halloween, six days before the 2024 election, Green Party nominee Jill Stein visited her office on Forbes Avenue in Oakland for a brief meet-and-greet and rally.

Stein was muddled in controversy since Hillary Clinton’s loss to Trump in 2016, where she was largely blamed for taking crucial votes away from Democrats in key swing states.

Pennsylvania was one of those states where Trump won by roughly 50,000 votes, the same amount Stein ran away with that critics argue would have gone to Democrats if she hadn’t run.

Today she faces the same criticisms. She originally planned on stepping down as the Green Party’s nominee after 2016, but after potential Green Party nominee Cornel West dropped out to form his campaign as an independent, Stein was forced to take up the mantle.

During her brief visit to the Green’s Oakland office, Stein gave an exclusive interview to The Globe.

Stein’s campaign has focused largely on foreign policy, namely looking toward an arms embargo on Israel. Her campaign also has plans to mediate other conflicts, like the War in Ukraine.

Stein said she would emphasize diplomacy in mediating and concluding the almost 10-year conflict between Russia and Ukraine. She added that the U.S.’s current policy of dominant military and economic aggression should be stopped.

“This is a disastrous policy,” Stein said. “This policy has been part of the expansion of NATO right up to the border of Russia, which basically contradicts a promise that was made by [NATO] at the time that the Soviet Union broke that we would not be coming to the border.

“Ukraine should not pour any more blood into a conflict they are not going to win. We should establish neutrality, ensure the integrity of Ukraine and Russia, and stop wasting Ukrainian and Russian lives,” Stein said.

She added that the effort to “bleed down Russia” would not work.

In 2015, Stein came under fire for sitting at a table with Russian President Vladimir Putin during a dinner celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Russian TV network RT. Her ties with Russia have since been a constant point of speculation from critics.

Stein’s status as a spoiler candidate was also a topic of discussion. She called criticism claiming that she reduced Harris’s chance at victory “self-serving propaganda” of an “endless war machine.”

“Politicians have to earn your votes, they don’t own your votes,” Stein said. “Right now, Kamala Harris could win back many votes. She lost those votes, and the question is are those voters going to support Donald Trump–which some of them are–or are they going to support an actual people-powered campaign.”

The Green Party’s platform promises to end student debt, make public higher education free, provide healthcare as a human right, implement rent control, provide 15 million units of free housing nationwide and prioritize sustainable climate policy.

Another major point of argument against Stein’s bid for president is her and the Green Party’s connection to Republicans, particularly Trump-affiliated lawyers who helped the Green Party get on the ballot in Wisconsin and Nevada.

“If they happen to be campaigning for us, that’s their doing. This is nothing that we have ever sanctioned or allowed,” Stein said. “One attorney, that was not even hired by us, was part of a pro-bono effort, which was multi-partisan, to enable Nevada to have a choice.

This was not a partisan issue, this was an issue of plain basic democracy,” Stein said.

Stein then briefly spoke to supporters gathered around the office, where she criticized Democrats for blocking Green efforts to appear on the ballot and for continuing to send military aid to Israel.

After this, Stein and Green Party members traveled a few blocks down to Schenley Plaza where they held a small rally. Supporters were given the opportunity to speak and hold vigil for Palestinian civilians killed in the Israel-Hamas War.

Some held a banner and signs promoting the Green Party. Others held mock political signs that read, “Abandon Harris.”

Stein left shortly after for an interview with KDKA’s politics editor, John Delano.

As of publishing, Stein currently polls at about 0.8% in Pennsylvania and roughly 2% nationally. She leads demographically among Muslim voters.