Editing Eldridge Cleaver (section)

===Black Panther Party===

Upon his release, Cleaver continued writing for ''Ramparts'' and was also organizing efforts to revitalize the OAAU.<ref name="Gun Barrel Politics">{{cite book |title=Gun-barrel Politics: The Black Panther Party, 1966–1971 – Report, Ninety-second Congress, First Session |series=92d Congress, 1st session. House report; no. 92-470 |date=1971 |publisher=U.S. Government Printing Office |location=Washington, D.C. |page=22 |url= https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015081808514;view=1up;seq=34|access-date=February 13, 2017}}</ref> The Black Panther Party (BPP) was then only two months old.<ref name="Cleaver, Eldridge Cleaver 2006" /> Cleaver joined the [[Oakland]]-based BPP, serving as Minister of Information, or [[spokesperson]]. What initially attracted him to the Panthers, as opposed to other radical groups, was the BPP's commitment to armed struggle.<ref>{{harvnb|Cleaver|1969|pp=[https://archive.org/details/eldridgecleaverpostprison/page/36/mode/2up 36–37]}}</ref>

In 1967, he, along with [[Marvin X]], [[Ed Bullins]], and Ethna Wyatt, formed the Black House political/cultural center in [[San Francisco]]. [[Amiri Baraka]], [[Sonia Sanchez]], [[Askia M. Touré|Askia Toure]], [[Sarah Webster Fabio]], [[Art Ensemble of Chicago]], Avotcja, Reginald Lockett, [[Emory Douglas]], Samuel Napier, [[Bobby Hutton]], [[Huey Newton]], and [[Bobby Seale]] were Black House regulars.<ref name=Baraka>{{cite book |title=The Autobiography of Leroi Jones |last=Baraka |first=Amiri |date=1984 |publisher=Lawrence Hill Books |isbn=1-55652-231-2}}</ref> The same year, he married [[Kathleen Neal Cleaver]] (divorced 1987), with whom he would have son Ahmad Maceo Eldridge (born 1969, Algeria; died 2018, Saudi Arabia) and daughter Joju Younghi (born July 31, 1970, [[Democratic People's Republic of Korea|North Korea]]).<ref name="NYTobit" /><ref name="NKnews">{{cite web |url= https://www.nknews.org/2012/12/the-black-panther-north-korean-juche-fetish/ |title=The Black Panther's Secret North Korean Fetish |last=Young |first=Benjamin R. |date=December 20, 2012 |access-date=March 5, 2017}}</ref>

In 1968, Cleaver was arrested on violation of parole by association with individual(s) of bad reputation, and control and possession of firearms.<ref>Court of Appeal, First District, Division 1, California. IN RE: Leroy Eldridge CLEAVER on Habeas Corpus. PEOPLE of the State of California, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. Leroy Eldridge CLEAVER, Defendant and Respondent.</ref> He petitioned for [[habeas corpus]] to the Solano County Court, and was granted it along with a release of a $50,000 bail.<ref name="Cleaver, Eldridge Cleaver 2006"/>

[[File:Cleaver_Presidential_Electional_Poster.png|thumb|A poster from Cleaver's 1968 presidential run]]
Cleaver was a [[President of the United States|presidential]] candidate in [[1968 United States Presidential Election|1968]] on the ticket of the [[United States Peace and Freedom Party|Peace and Freedom Party]].<ref>Warren, Jenifer; [https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1998-may-02-mn-45607-story.html "Former Black Panther Eldridge Cleaver Dies at 62"], ''The Los Angeles Times'', May 2, 1998.</ref> Having been born on August 31, 1935, he would not have been the requisite 35 years of age until more than a year after Inauguration Day 1969 (although the [[US Constitution|Constitution]] requires the president to be at least 35 years of age, it does not specify whether the age must be reached at the time of nomination, election, or inauguration). Courts in [[Hawaii]] and [[New York (state)|New York]] held that Cleaver could be excluded from the ballot because he did not meet the Constitutional criteria.<ref>''Jones v. Gill'' (1968) 50 Haw. 618, 446 P.2d 558; Garst v. Lomenzo (N.Y. County Supm. Ct. 1968) 57 Misc.2d 1040, 294 N.Y.S.2d 33, aff'd (1968) 22 N.Y.2d 956, 242 N.E.2d 482, 295 N.Y.S.2d 330.</ref>

In the aftermath of the [[assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.]] on April 4, 1968, there were riots across the nation. On April 6, Cleaver and 14 other Panthers were involved in a confrontation with [[Oakland Police Department|Oakland police officers]], during which two of the officers were wounded. Cleaver was wounded during the ambush and 17-year-old Black Panthers member [[Bobby Hutton]] was killed. They were armed with M16 rifles and shotguns.<ref>Gates, Henry Louis, Jr.; [https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/race/interviews/ecleaver.html "Interview with Eldridge Cleaver"], ''Frontline'', PBS, Spring 1997.</ref><ref name=KateColeman>Kate Coleman, {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20110723044742/http://colemantruth.net/kate1.pdf "Souled Out: Eldridge Cleaver Admits He Ambushed Those Cops"]}}, ''New West'', May 19, 1980.</ref> In 1980, he claimed that he had led the Panther group on a deliberate ambush of the police officers, thus provoking the shootout.<ref name=KateColeman />

Some reporters were surprised by this move, because it was in the context of an uncharacteristic speech in which Cleaver also discredited the Black Panthers, stating, "we need police as heroes", and said that he denounced civilian review boards of police shootings for the "bizarre" reason that "it is a rubber stamp for murder". Some speculated Cleaver's admission could have been a pay-off to the Alameda County justice system, whose judge had only just days earlier let him avoid prison time; Cleaver was sentenced to community service after getting charged with three counts of assault against three Oakland police officers.<ref name=KateColeman /> The [[PBS]] documentary ''A Huey Newton Story'' claims that "Bobby Hutton was shot more than twelve times after he had already surrendered and stripped down to his underwear to prove he was not armed."<ref>[https://www.pbs.org/hueypnewton/people/people_hutton.html "Bobby Hutton"], PBS.</ref>
[[File:"It's_Time_to_Intensify_the_Struggle"_political_button_Eldridge_Cleaver.jpg|thumb|A button featuring a depiction of Black Panther Eldridge Cleaver with the slogan, "It's Time to Intensify the Struggle"]]
Charged with [[attempted murder]] after the incident, Cleaver [[jumped bail]] to flee to [[Cuba]] in late 1968.<ref name="NYTobit" /> Initially treated with hospitality by the Cuban government, this ended with reports that [[Fidel Castro]] had received information of the [[CIA]] infiltrating the Black Panther Party. Cleaver then decided to head to [[Algeria]], sending word to his wife to meet him there.<ref name="Cleaver, Eldridge Cleaver 2006"/><ref name="ReferenceA">"Leroy Eldridge Cleaver". Retrieved February 20, 2014.</ref> [[Elaine Mokhtefi|Elaine Klein]] normalized his status by getting him an invitation to attend the Pan-African Cultural festival, rendering him temporarily safe from prosecution.<ref name="Malloy"/>

The festival allowed him to network with revolutionaries from all over Africa in order to discuss the perils of white supremacy and colonialism. Cleaver was outspoken in his call to violence against the United States, contributing to his mission to "position the Panthers within the revolutionary nationalist camp inside the United States and as disciples of [[Frantz Fanon|Fanon]] on the world stage".<ref name="Malloy">Malloy, Sean L. (2017). Out of Oakland. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. {{ISBN|978-1-5017-1342-2}}.</ref> Cleaver had set up an international office for the Black Panthers in Algeria.<ref name="ReferenceA"/> Following [[Timothy Leary]]'s [[Weather Underground]]-assisted [[prison escape]], Leary stayed with Cleaver in [[Algiers]]; however, Cleaver placed Leary under "revolutionary arrest" as a [[counter-revolutionary]] for promoting drug use.

Cleaver cultivated an alliance with [[North Korea]] in 1969, and BPP publications began reprinting excerpts from [[Kim Il Sung]]'s writings. Although leftists of the time often looked to Cuba, [[China]], and [[North Vietnam]] for inspiration, few had paid any attention to the secretive [[Pyongyang]] regime. Bypassing U.S. travel restrictions on North Korea, Cleaver and other BPP members made two visits to North Korea in 1969–1970 with the idea that the ''[[juche]]'' model could be adapted to the revolutionary liberation of African-Americans. Taken on an official tour of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, also known as North Korea, Cleaver expressed admiration at "the DPRK's stable, crime-free society which provided guaranteed food, employment, and housing for all, and which had no economic or social inequalities".

In the summer of 1970, Cleaver traveled to China as part a U.S. People's Anti-Imperialist Delegation along with another prominent party member, [[Elaine Brown]].<ref name=":Minami">{{Cite book |last=Minami |first=Kazushi |title=People's Diplomacy: How Americans and Chinese Transformed US-China Relations during the Cold War |date=2024 |publisher=[[Cornell University Press]] |isbn=9781501774157 |location=Ithaca, NY}}</ref>{{Rp|page=39}}

Byron Vaughn Booth (former Panther Deputy Minister of Defense<ref name="NKnews" />) claimed that, after a trip to North Korea, Cleaver discovered that his wife had been having an affair with Clinton Robert Smith Jr., a fellow Black Panther. Booth told the FBI he had witnessed Cleaver shoot and kill Smith with an AK-47 in Algeria.<ref name="Rosenzweig">{{cite news |work=[[Los Angeles Times]]|title=Ex-Panther Says He Saw Cleaver Kill a Man |last=Rosenzweig |first=David |date=February 24, 2001 |url= https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2001-feb-24-me-29765-story.html |access-date= March 5, 2017}}</ref> [[Elaine Mokhtefi]], in the ''London Review of Books'', writes that Cleaver confessed the murder to her shortly after committing it.<ref>{{Cite news |title=Diary |last=Mokhtefi |first=Elaine |date=June 1, 2017 |work=London Review of Books }}</ref>

In his 1978 book ''Soul on Fire'', Cleaver made several claims regarding his [[exile]] in [[Algeria]], including that he was supported by regular [[stipend]]s from the government of [[North Vietnam]], which the United States was then bombing. Cleaver stated that he was followed by other former criminals turned [[revolutionaries]], many of whom (including Booth and Smith<ref name="Rosenzweig" />) [[skyjacking|hijacked planes]] to get to Algeria.<ref>{{cite book |last=Cleaver |first=Eldridge |title=Soul on Fire |publisher=[[Word Records|Word Books]] |date=1978 |location=[[Waco, Texas]]}}</ref>