[6][7] On May 5, 2020, Hawkins announced that former Socialist Party USA vice presidential candidate Angela Nicole Walker would be his running mate.

[11] In the early 1990s a press conference was held in Washington, D.C., that featured Charles Betz, Joni Whitmore, Hilda Mason, and Howie Hawkins to announce the formation of the Greens/Green Party USA.

[18] On April 3, 2019, Hawkins announced that he was forming an exploratory committee to prepare for a potential candidacy for the Green Party 2020 presidential nomination and formally launched his campaign on May 28, 2019, in Brooklyn, New York.

[28] In August 2020, Solidarity withdrew their endorsement following a poll of its members, instead taking no official position on the presidential election.

[36] On September 1, the Green Party of Alaska nominated Jesse Ventura for president and Cynthia McKinney for vice-president instead of Hawkins and Walker.

[38][39] On May 28, 2020, the Green Party of Rhode Island announced that it would not place a presidential candidate onto the ballot for the first time since 1996 citing the danger of Donald Trump winning reelection.

[42] However, Hawkins failed to qualify for the Rhode Island ballot after submitting only 897 valid signatures in his petition to run for office.

[43] A challenge was filed against Hawkins in Pennsylvania stating that the Green Party's stand-in candidates for president and vice-president had not submitted a declaration of candidacy.

[48] Hawkins' presidential petition in Wisconsin was challenged in August under the basis that Walker had changed her residence address within South Carolina.

[53] The Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled four to three in favor of the election commission on September 14, citing that Hawkins had waited too long to file a lawsuit and that it would cause too much disruption to place his name on the ballot.

[56] On July 9, 2020, the Hawkins campaign announced they achieved federal matching fund requirements in 20 necessary states, claiming they had raised $220,000 from 4,000 donors in over 7,000 total contributions.

[58] He was a critic of the Democratic version of the Green New Deal written by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, stating that "unfortunately, they took the brand but watered down the content".

"[104] LaRiva responded stating that it was "not an honest critique" and "[f]or Hawkins to further imply that he is the stronger supporter of Peace and Freedom is not convincing.