Greatest living American elimination game (setup thread)

Inspired by these threads, The President Elimination Game - The Game Room - Straight Dope Message Board and Greatest American elimination game (game thread).

Who is the greatest living American?

You may nominate up to five noteworthy Americans, from any walk of life, describing each in no more than three words. If you use more than three words, or objectionable, misleading or inaccurate language, expect to be edited. Naturalized (but not honorary) U.S. citizens are eligible for nomination, even if they are more famous for things done as citizens of another country.

Nominations will close at noon EST a week from today, on Mon. June 16. After the deadline, I’ll arrange the nominees alphabetically and we’ll vote them out much as we did in the earlier games.

My nominees:

Anthony Fauci: Physician, immunologist, scientist
Mark Kelly: Senator, astronaut, aviator
Barack Obama: President, statesman, lawyer
Bruce Springsteen: Singer, songwriter, activist
Janet Yellen: Economist, Treasury secretary

I don’t need to re-nominate any you did, right? Obama would be on my list.

Amanda Gorman - poet, activist, prodigy

Steven Spielberg - director, writer, entertainer

Joe Biden - president, uniter, overcomer

Craig Ferguson - polymath, director-writer, comedian

Jim Gaffigan - comedian, author, cultural-analyst

Again, not nominating anyone already nominated

Dolly Parton - artist, humanitarian

Warren Buffet - level-headed billionaire

Bill Gates - Futurist, philanthropist, billionaire

José Andrés - humanitarian, chef
Tim Walz - honorable political messenger

[Moderating]
Moving from Game Room to Thread Games.

I’d add:

Greta Thunberg, environmental activist

David Attenborough, filmmaker, environmental activist

Are these all Americans or just humans?

Correct, Mahaloth, one nomination is sufficient. You need not renominate anyone.

Craig Ferguson and José Andrés are naturalized U.S. citizens, so they are valid nominees.

Good question, Southern_Yankee. Greta Thunberg is Swedish and David Attenborough is British, so I will disqualify them.

Elizabeth Warren > fighting the repuglies.

This is a real toughie - I came up with a bunch of controversial ones, then pared it down a bit, keeping some of the controversies:

Mitt Romney - Senator, impeachment juror
Amory Lovins - Physicist, energy activist
Taylor Swift - Musician, songwriter, icon
Spike Lee - Filmmaker, Knicks fan
Simone Biles - GOAT gymnast

I’d have loved to put Jimmy Carter, Willie Mays and Brian Wilson on this list.

For some reason, this doesn’t seem to be getting the attention of the previous elimination games. Maybe it’s a little harder to find greatness in the present tense?

With the death of Jimmy Carter, this is a great time to do this. He was a pretty likely choice for a lot of people, so now we need to look at what we have now.

Dolly Parton - Entertainer, philanthropist, icon
John Glenn - Astronaut, aviator, politician

I’m afraid I have some bad news for you.

Doh… I am going to have a serious chat with my fact checker…

I think there’s only one indisputably great living United States national: Stephen King.

John Glenn may be dead but Jim Lovell is still alive and he’s my nominee.

Thought of another one: Jesse Jackson

If you wish to nominate anyone, please see the OP, and submit a three-word description along with the name. Thanks.

MacKenzie Scott - philanthropist, prize-winning novelist