Unaffiliated delegates stage sit-in protest against the war
Unhappy with the lack of Palestinian speakers speaking out against the war, non-committal delegates staged a sit-in at the Democratic National Convention.
CHICAGO — Failing to get their demand to allow a Palestinian American to speak about the war in Gaza at the Democratic National Convention through, a group of undecided delegates ended a protest rally outside the United Center on Thursday with a new demand: that Vice President Kamala Harris meet with Arabs from the U.S. and Muslims in Michigan and elsewhere.
They also set 15 September as the deadline for one or more such meetings.
While organizers did not say what they would or would not do if a meeting to discuss their call for a U.S. ceasefire in Gaza did not happen, they hinted that there would be consequences, which could mean holding back on the fall campaign trail and not being as active in supporting Harris or representing her causes to voters.
In some swing states like Michigan, with its large Arab-American and Muslim communities in and around Dearborn, that effect could damage Harris’ chances of beating Republican former President Donald Trump, although organizers made it clear they do not want Trump to win.
“I think that would be disastrous for her campaign,” said Layla Elabed, a Dearborn resident and one of the founders of the movement, which aims to get voters in the Michigan primaries and across the country to vote undecided rather than for President Joe Biden to protest Biden’s support for Israel in its counterattack on Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
Organizers held a press conference Thursday evening, just hours before Harris was scheduled to deliver her speech accepting the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination, making her the first Black woman and first woman of South Asian descent to be nominated as a major party candidate in the United States.
Harris secured enough delegates late last month to become the nominee after Biden stepped down and endorsed her.
Organizers of the Michigan-based Undecided Movement and the 30 undecided delegates elected across the country had been lobbying for months to include a pro-Palestinian speaker in the convention’s main program, and those efforts intensified after the event began in Chicago this week.
But on Wednesday evening, organizers said democratic officials had finally turned them down.
The blow was particularly devastating because Wednesday’s convention also featured speeches by Jonathan Dekel-Chen – whose son Sagui is being held hostage in Gaza – and the parents of Israeli-American hostage Hersh Goldberg-Polin, even though Jon Polin and Rachel Goldberg had said in their speech that they agreed that there must be a ceasefire and an end to the “suffering of the innocent people of Gaza.”
But this was little consolation for the movement’s hesitant organizers, who said it was only right that a Palestinian, or someone on his behalf, should be allowed to speak about the carnage and deaths in Gaza caused by Israel’s harsh crackdown on Hamas following its October 7 attacks on Israel.
The United States and other states have so far failed to broker a ceasefire between the parties that would provide for the release of Hamas prisoners in Israel and hostages held in the Gaza Strip.
Waleed Shahid, one of the founders, said Thursday that the Democratic Party had made several offers to the group, including meetings with senior campaign officials but no speaking engagements. He told reporters that the Harris campaign had said the group “could not define the biggest moment in the vice president’s political life.” The Harris campaign did not respond to requests for comment on the decision.
The rejection prompted several delegates to stage a sit-in outside the United Center that began at about 8:30 p.m. Wednesday night and lasted until about 6:30 p.m. Thursday, when they broke up and announced the new demand. Delegates had planned to return to the convention hall before Harris’ speech, but were not planning any disruptions, organizers said.
Organizers said they did not see the outcome as a loss for their movement, as they had some successes to their name, including a panel discussion held elsewhere earlier in the week that was recognized as an official party event, albeit in a different location, on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, where tens of thousands have died. And when it was announced that they had been denied a speaker, other groups spoke up.
The group Muslim Women for Harris-Walz announced it was disbanding, saying it could not “in good conscience continue” with the rejection of such a demand. The powerful United Auto Workers union, which supports Harris, said it was a mistake to deny a Palestinian the right to speak, as did other politicians.
“If we are to win this election, the Democratic Party must allow a Palestinian-American speaker to speak on the DNC stage tonight,” the UAW said in a statement.
Politically, it is unclear at this point whether Harris, whose poll numbers are far better than Biden’s compared to Trump’s, has seen a surge among other voters, including black and younger voters, that can offset any reluctance among Arab-American and Muslim communities to support her. She has also already taken steps to open talks with organizers, having met briefly with Elabed and another of the movement’s founders, Abbas Alawieh, also of Dearborn, before a rally in metro Detroit a few weeks ago. Harris has also sent campaign staff to metro Detroit to speak with community leaders as well as Jewish leaders.
Elabed said Harris had promised future talks at their earlier meeting, but a political adviser to the vice president later said an arms embargo against Israel was out of the question.
Elabed, the sister of Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Democrat), the only Palestinian-American woman in Congress, said the movement to raise awareness of Palestinian rights is not going away. She called this week “just four days of what our movement has planned for the next four years and beyond,” adding, “We are not going anywhere.”
Tlaib was among those who reached out to movement organizers on Thursday to express her support, while other speakers at a press conference earlier in the day and again in the evening said Harris was out of step with public opinion in the Democratic Party and said most of its members wanted a ceasefire.
Jim Zogby, founder of the Arab American Institute in Washington, said every keynote speaker who has mentioned Gaza so far this week – including Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison and U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont – has received an ovation.
“It was an unnecessary mistake,” he said of the decision not to call a Palestinian speaker. “It was stupid.”
Abbas Alawieh of Dearborn, one of the movement’s founders along with Elabed and a delegate who slept during the sit-in outside the United Center on Wednesday night, said he was proud of his companions and the hundreds of Harris delegates who also signed a letter supporting a ceasefire.
“Our movement is popular,” he said. “Our movement is on the rise.”
Contact Todd Spangler: [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter@tsspangler.
