Eli Pendergast

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**Elias Ross Pendergast** (March 14, 2200 - August 16, 2309) was an American politician who served as the 101st President of the United States from 2264 to 2269.

# Early Life

Elias Ross Pendergast was born on March 14, 2200, to Rochester and Elizabeth Pendergast in Ithaca, New York. Pendergast's family would be upper-class and faced few troubles from the Imperialist regime of Emperor Thorton, thus allowing Pendergast to live a comfortable childhood. Over the course of it, however, Pendergast would secretly detest the Emperor, viewing him as a greedy buffoon who destroyed what Pendergast thought of as the "dream of national unity". Thus, when Emperor Echevarria was assassinated in 2215, Pendergast expressed how he was overjoyed that national unity would finally come about.

In 2222, Pendergast graduated from Cornell University with a bachelor's degree in political science. Following his college graduation, he would serve in the US Army for two years.

# Entry into Politics

Pendergast would run for the New York State Senate in 2224. Although he won the Liberty Party's primary in this election, he would lose the election to Commawatch nominee Adam Donaldson. He would run once again for the seat in 2226, and after losing the Liberty Party's primary, he would instead run for Mayor of Ithaca in 2227. He would win this election by a landslide, thus obtaining the position.

# Mayor of Ithaca

As Mayor, Pendergast would successfully pass a flat tax for the residents of Ithaca, in addition to keeping spending low. He would prove to be a quite popular Mayor, and would thus serve in the position for three terms until 2239 (not running for a fourth term). In 2240, Pendergast would once again run for the state Senate, this time successfully obtaining the position.

# Senator from New York

In New York's Senate, Pendergast would advocate for the same fiscally conservative policies he did as Mayor. Although he would face less success, he would win a total of four terms before being offered to become a professor at Cornell in 2250. Accepting the position, Pendergast would retire from the Senate.

Pendergast would serve as a professor for the next 12 years, before hearing of Omarosa Sandoval's victory in the Liberty Party Presidential primaries. Seeing a political opportunity, Pendergast wrote to Sandoval, offering to become his running mate and saying that he was largely a political outsider (having only served in New York's state government in fairly low positions), which Sandoval valued. Being impressed with his charisma, intellect, and resume, Sandoval chose him for the position, thus seeing Pendergast become his Vice President.

# Vice Presidency (2261-2264)

During the Sandoval Administration, Pendergast found that this President would be more chaotic than he thought; not only was Sandoval a partisan zealot (as Pendergast already knew and thus thought he could influence), but he often used his power as leverage for blackmail that would aid his political gain. Early in the administration, Sandoval would instruct Pendergast to do the same, telling him to dissolve the Senate (by refusing to let it hold sessions) through his position as President of the Senate. Knowing this was corrupt and that Sandoval was going too far, Pendergast refused and possessed doubts about Sandoval's fitness to serve as President; given that Sandoval didn't get his way, however, Pendergast avoided the 25th Amendment at that time.

From there, however, the actions of President Sandoval would only worsen. In October of 2261, Pendergast met with Sandoval's Cabinet about discussing enactment of the 25th Amendment. Although some were in favor of it, most were on the fence at that the time, claiming that they could advise Sandoval against immediately following his impulses in the future. Thus, the decision was made to give Sandoval one more chance as President before they declare him incapable of service.

While the Cabinet recognized that Sandoval committed a grave mistake and Constitutional violation, Sandoval maintained the stance that he did no wrong, and began to blame foreign governments for his administration's backlash. The Cabinet saw this as the beginning of a new crisis, as Pendergast went to Sandoval and demanded that he cease his rhetoric and publicly recognize his mistakes; Pendergast told Sandoval that this would be better for both his own administration and the nation. Sandoval refused to listen to Pendergast, however, telling him to "know [his] place" (which Pendergast would later call "ironic" due to Sandoval's longtime anti-establishment stance) whilst insulting Pendergast's intelligence and competence. As Sandoval threatened nuclear war, the Cabinet declared this the final straw, and enacted the 25th Amendment, thus making Pendergast Acting President.

## Acting Presidency

A few hours after becoming Acting President, Pendergast would address the American people, explaining what happened and promising to control and undo any damage which President Sandoval inflicted. He would also say that while he respected the tradition of Presidents using limited power, "situations like these are why we keep [executive power] in the Constitutions", and he would thus use anything he needs to so that, in the least corrupt manner possible, he could personally and efficiently "clean the mess President Sandoval created".

With his Presidential authority, first as Acting President and later as official President, Pendergast would start by first delivering financial compensation to those who were affected by President Sandoval's Constitutional violation, and issued an executive order telling all government attorneys to concede in lawsuits the individuals in question file against the government. In addition to compensating citizens, he would reimburse the local and state governments responsible for repairing the areas in which fights broke out between the national guard and protesters. Following this, he would visit the nations Sandoval threatened and would apologize on behalf of the United States, saying that his administration would work to ensure nothing of the sorts happened again. Following this, Pendergast reduced the military budget of the United States to "provide assurance against President Sandoval's previous threats".

In the Presidential Election of 2264, President Pendergast would be receive criticism from other Liberty Presidential candidates, who claimed that Pendergast was spending too much, thus creating an economic burden on the American taxpayer and national debt; they also accused Pendergast of being too close to Sandoval to be fit for the Presidency. Pendergast responded to these allegations by saying that he aided the people by compensating them generously in the name of their Constitutional rights, and that he was the one remove Sandoval's Presidential powers through the 25th Amendment. Following his victory in the primary against traditionalist (as his opposition within the Liberty Party came to be called) Matthew Johnson (winning with 55% of the vote to Johnson's 45%), Pendergast would face similar criticism from Commawatch Presidential nominee Andrew Bal, who displayed suspicion of Pendergast being too close to Sandoval in addition to him "abusing" the authority of the Presidency; Pendergast would respond to these criticisms by once again saying that he removed Sandoval from power and that he used the Presidential power to only clean a mess, and nothing more. The American people would ultimately recognize the work President Pendergast put forth for the nation, thus seeing him win the popular vote and the electoral college.

Towards the middle of his second term, the nation would be in a condition closer to what it was prior to the Sandoval Administration. Because of this, President Pendergast announced that he would rescind the position of chief legislator and would return the veto to something only to be used to protect the US Constitution. Despite this, he would maintain other direct Presidential powers, such as the use of direct executive orders and directives to enforce the law and the direct proposal of budgets; Pendergast would put an end to the limits Presidents Henry Doss and Theodore Vogel imposed on themselves.

Following the conclusion of his second term in 2269 as President of the United States, Pendergast became the President of Cornell, in addition to writing books about his political ideologies (both those of when he was young and when he wrote the books in question) and experiences during the Sandoval Administration. He would retire in 2290 at age 90, before dying in 2309 at age 109.