Local man running for president in 2016

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (NM) - An Albuquerque man is coming out of retirement to become president of the United States in 2016.

Russ Sype is a retired Intel statistician and is just shy of his 60th birthday.

He announced his candidacy in August in front of a small group of supporters at a local hotel.

The democrat said the decision to run came out of frustration.

“No one is seriously discussing the real issues that are facing us in an intelligent way,” said Sype.

He believes those real issues are the economy and foreign policy. Sype is hoping his campaign will change the dialogue of national politics.

However he does admit that is a tall task, especially for someone like him.

“The initial problem is name recognition,” he said.

That is because Sype has never held nor even run for public office before.

When KRQE News 13 asked potential voters if they had heard of the New Mexican running for the white house the results were not promising.

Robert Turner said he had no idea who Sype was.

“I thought that was Gary Johnson,” Jenny White said.

Sype says that is precisely why he is getting an early start to get his name and platforms out there.

In the meantime there are also some administrative things he has to take care of in order to run too.

“I have to have a treasurer I have to have a registered campaign committee with a bank account that files routine quarterly reports,” Sype said.

The candidate says he realizes being elected to the nation’s top job is a long shot but he said that is not going to stop him from trying.

Even though Sype has never held office before he has volunteered for campaigns in the past so he said he has a good idea of how they work.

Anyone wishing to learn more about the 2016 candidate can contact him on Facebook or via his campaign email which is RussSype2016@comcast.net