In the Michigan primary tomorrow, some Democrats plan to vote “uncommitted,” instead of casting a ballot for President Joe Biden, to protest his administration’s support for Israel’s war on Gaza.
The Listen to Michigan campaign—which has attracted support from dozens of Michigan Democratic leaders, including Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib—comes as the death toll in Gaza has surpassed 29,000 people, according to the latest figures from the Gaza Health Ministry.
The campaign says it hopes that, if successful, “Biden would feel more at risk of losing Michigan in the general election, prompting a potential reassessment of his financing and backing of Israel’s war in Gaza.”
Democratic state Rep. Abraham Aiyash, Michigan’s highest-ranking Arab and Muslim leader, told Democracy Now that “it is not a radical idea for us to suggest that the richest and most powerful country in the history of the world should not be funding what we see as a genocide,” adding that supporters want to see a permanent ceasefire, more aid delivered to Gaza, and restrictions on the aid delivered to Israel.
Michigan is a crucial swing state—Trump won by just over 11,000 votes in 2016—with large Arab and Muslim populations. And polling shows the majority of voters nationally disapprove of Biden’s handling of Israel’s war. The latest campaign hopes to attract the same number of voters as the ones that made the difference in 2016 to send a message to the White House before November.
The New York Times published a profile on Monday of a 67-year-old Palestinian American Democratic activist named Terry Ahwal, who campaigned for Biden in 2020 and plans to vote “uncommitted” on Tuesday.
“You want my vote? You cannot kill my people in my name. As simple as that,” she told the Times.
Abdullah Hammoud, mayor of the Michigan city of Dearborn, had a similar message for the White House in an op-ed published with the Times last week, alleging that Biden “calls for our votes once more while at the same time selling the very bombs that Benjamin Netanyahu’s military is dropping on our family and friends.”
When asked about the effort in an interview on CNN on Sunday, Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said that “any vote that’s not cast for Joe Biden supports a second Trump term,” before later adding, “I’m just not sure what to expect” on Tuesday. (As the Times notes, it’s unclear just how big the protest vote will be.) Echoing Whitmer’s argument, a centrist Democratic pro-Israel group has launched an ad campaign alleging that “voting uncommitted hurts Biden, which helps Donald Trump and his hateful agenda,” the Intercept reported Friday.
But the Listen to Michigan campaign disputes this notion, pointing to the fact that “there is a long time between now and November for Biden to change his policies and earn support from Democratic voters.”
Julianne McShane
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