Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

GOP-Backed Independent Candidate for President Studied in Israel

Evan McMullin, a Brigham Young University graduate who  in Israel on a Defense Department grant, has announced that he will run as an independent in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

McMullin announced his candidacy on Monday.

He worked as an undercover operations officer for the Central Intelligence Agency and later as a senior national security and policy advisor in the House of Representatives.

McMullin, 40, is unmarried and is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or Mormon Church.

In 2011 he earned an MBA at the Wharton School of Economics at the University of Pennsylvania and worked at Goldman Sachs.

McMullin’s campaign will have the support of key players in the GOP’s anti-Trump movement, Buzzfeed News reported.

“Like millions of Americans, I had hoped this year would bring us better nominees who, despite party differences, could offer compelling visions of a better future. Instead, we have been left with two candidates who are fundamentally unfit for the profound responsibilities they seek,” McMullin said in a letter announcing his candidacy.

McMullin studied in Israel while an undergraduate at BYU as a David L. Boren Scholar with the Department of Defense’s National Security Education Program, through The David M. Kennedy Center for International Studies. He called his studies in Israel “a perfect capstone to the traditional coursework I had done in Provo.”

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and the protests on college campuses.

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly. 

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at editorial@forward.com, subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.

Exit mobile version