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dearborn michigan
In 'Tense' Meeting, Arab Leaders in Michigan Warn White House to Change Course on Gaza
"If President Biden wants a shot here in Michigan, he's going to need to do something different," said one leader.
Feb 09, 2024
A week after Arab American and Muslim leaders in Michigan refused a meeting with U.S. President Joe Biden's campaign over the White House's continued support for Israel's bombardment of Gaza, several representatives of the community met Thursday with a group of top Biden aides—but came away unconvinced that the administration understands the stakes involved in its failure to listen to demands for a cease-fire.
"If President Biden wants a shot here in Michigan, he's going to need to do something different," Abbas Alawieh, a senior Democratic strategist and spokesperson for Listen to Michigan, a group that is urging cease-fire supporters in the state to vote "uncommitted" on primary ballots on February 27, toldHuffPost.
Alawieh's comments came after he, state Rep. Abraham Aiyash (D-4), Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud, Wayne County Deputy Executive Assad Turfe, and others met with administration officials.
Alawieh told the outlet that the meeting was "very tense," with attendees informing U.S. Agency for International Development head Samantha Power and senior presidential adviser Tom Perez, among other officials, of specific demands.
The group reiterated its call for Biden to make a direct demand that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agree to a permanent cease-fire and for the U.S. to immediately reinstate funding for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).
The suspension of UNRWA funds have left the agency risking a "complete collapse" of its humanitarian response in Gaza, where at least 27,947 Palestinians have been killed by the Israel Defense Forces since October 7. More than one million displaced Palestinians have taken shelter in UNRWA shelters, where aid workers are struggling to provide food, medical care, and potable water in the face of Israel's near-total blockade.
Hammoud said on social media after the meeting that the views of Arab Americans and the majority of Democratic voters who support a cease-fire and increased aid for civilians "have not been accurately captured by mainstream media and have failed to reach the highest office in our government" over the past several months.
"This meeting was held to ensure that the White House and those with the ability to change the course of the genocide unfolding in Gaza very clearly hear and understand the demands of our community, directly from us," said Hammoud.
In the meeting, said the mayor, the local and state leaders "remained uncompromising in our values and our demands."
"As citizens of the United States of America and representatives of the city of Dearborn, we have done our duty; now it is incumbent upon the president to do the same," said Hammoud.
But the meeting adjourned without the White House aides giving assurances that Biden would do so, even though a growing number of leaders in the state—both within the Arab American and Muslim communities and outside of it—have signed on to the Listen to Michigan campaign.
By voting "uncommitted" in the primary, supporters are hoping to send an urgent message to Biden that his refusal to meet the demands of the community—and 7 in 10 Democrats in an Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll released last week—could be a grave miscalculation and cost him crucial votes in the general election in November.
Shadb Singh, an organizer with Listen to Michigan, reported Wednesday that the campaign appears to be taking off with voters based on the attendance of a mass mobilization call.
Biden won Michigan, a key swing state, by just 154,000 votes in 2020, and the Muslim population in the state includes 200,000 registered voters.
Last month, before Hammoud and other leaders refused to engage with Biden during his campaign stop, the president dismissed a question from a reporter about his cratering support among Arab Americans amid his backing of Israel.
"We understand who cares about the Arab population," he said, comparing himself to former President Donald Trump, who is running for the Republican presidential nomination and has easily won several primary contests so far.
Alawieh said the White House officials were "lucky to be hearing from the expertise of people harmed by the very policies the Biden administration is championing," but the attendees were skeptical that the president's team understood the risk Biden is running by assuming he has the support of Arab Americans.
"This was about ensuring the administration sees the real impact of its policies, not just on foreign soil but right here, affecting our people, our families," Turfe told HuffPost. "We made it clear that any future engagement with the administration is conditional upon real action. The developments in Gaza will serve as the benchmark for evaluating the effectiveness of the administration’s actions. The Biden administration must act swiftly and decisively to end this violence, honoring the principles of justice and human rights."
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Dearborn Mayor Among Wave of Michigan Officials to Join 'Uncommitted' Campaign
"We must hold our president accountable and ensure that we, the American taxpayers, are no longer forced to be accomplices in a genocide that is backed and funded by the United States government," said Mayor Abdullah Hammoud.
Feb 07, 2024
More than 30 state representatives, mayors, city council members, and other elected officials in Michigan on Wednesday announced they had joined a grassroots effort to push voters in the crucial swing state to send a clear warning to U.S. President Joe Biden in the upcoming Democratic primary by voting "uncommitted."
The elected officials, including Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud, are joining the Listen to Michigan movement to signal to Biden that they will not commit to supporting him in the November general election until he uses his vast influence to stop Israel's slaughter of civilians across Gaza by calling for a cease-fire and ending his administration's financial backing of the Israel Defense Forces.
Hammoud, who garnered national attention late last month when he refused to meet with Biden during a campaign stop in Michigan, said he and other officials in the state "demand a better future and we intend to make our voices heard on February 27," encouraging voters to "pledge to vote 'uncommitted' in the upcoming presidential primary election."
"Under the direction of President Joe Biden, our government has failed to act to protect the lives of innocent men, women, and children," said Hammoud. "Worse yet, President Biden and his administration have suggested that there is an exception to this rule when it comes to Palestinian lives."
The Listen to Michigan campaign, led by Palestinian American community organizer and Dearborn resident Layla Elabed, officially launched on Tuesday with advocates noting that the Arab American population—more than 211,000 people—in the key state is a powerful voting bloc whose demands for a cease-fire Biden is ignoring at his own peril.
"We cannot support his financial backing of actions in Gaza that conflict with our core values of peace and humanity," said Elabed. "Voting 'uncommitted' is our way of demanding change and the vehicle to return our political power back to us... Many of us voted for Biden in 2020, including myself. We got out the vote for him and helped him win the state of Michigan. But now we are saying, 'Count us out, Joe.'"
Along with Hammoud, state Reps. Abraham Alyash (D-9), Alabas Farhat (D-3), and Erin Byrnes (D-15) signed a letter dated Tuesday, expressing their intention to vote "uncommitted" on their primary ballots. Wayne County Commissioners Sam Baydoun and Al Haidous, four Dearborn city councilmembers, and more than a dozen school board members from several cities were also among the officials who signed.
"We must hold our president accountable and ensure that we, the American taxpayers, are no longer forced to be accomplices in a genocide that is backed and funded by the United States government," reads the letter. "These are not empty words, they signify our steadfast commitment to justice, dignity, and the sanctity of human life, which is greater than loyalty to any candidate or party."
Listen to Michigan pointed out on its official website that "uncommitted" primary campaigns are not unheard of in the state. In 2008, when then-Democratic primary candidate Barack Obama's name did not appear on ballots after the state moved its voting date up, "his campaign mobilized young and Black voters to vote 'uncommitted' as a symbolic (and real) rejection of Hillary Clinton," garnering 40% of the vote.
The growing support for the effort among dozens of elected officials, said Democratic strategist Waleed Shahid, is "a big deal."
"This is BIG!" added Lansing-based climate and housing organizer William Lawrence. "All Michigan folks—this is real, this has legs. Make sure your friends know to vote uncommitted."
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'Uncommitted': Michigan Group Urges Primary Protest Vote Against Biden Over Gaza
"President Biden has been a successful candidate in the past by representing a broad coalition, but right now he's not representing the vast majority of Democrats who want a cease-fire," said Listen to Michigan.
Feb 06, 2024
As voters in the key swing state of Michigan prepare to cast their ballots in the Democratic primary at the end of February, a grassroots group is urging residents to send a clear warning to U.S. President Joe Biden by letting him know they are "uncommitted" to supporting him in the 2024 election, due to his support for Israel's bombardment of Gaza.
Officially launching on Tuesday, Listen to Michigan is calling on voters in the state—which has a sizable Arab American community—to fill in the bubble marked "uncommitted" on their primary ballots on February 27. Biden, who won the first Democratic primary last week in South Carolina with 96% of the vote, will be on the ballot along with Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minn.) and author Marianne Williamson.
Layla Elabed, an activist and the sister of progressive Palestinian American Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), is leading the group, which is planning to contact at least 80% of the 128,000 voters on its mailing list before the primary.
Elabed told The New York Times Tuesday that voters in Michigan must use their power as a voting bloc in the key state, where Biden only narrowly defeated former Republican President Donald Trump in 2020.
"We have the political power to really shift Biden's election," Elabed toldthe Times. "We did it in 2020."
The group's plan is hardly the first sign that Biden's continued funding and defense of Israel's relentless attacks on civilians in Gaza has alarmed many Democratic voters, including those in Michigan.
Eighty percent of Democrats told Data for Progress in one poll in October that the U.S. should push for a cease-fire in Gaza, and a survey by The Economistlast month showed that 50% of people who voted for Biden in 2020 believe the military operation the president has helped fund—in which Israel has now killed at least 27,585 people—amounts to a genocide.
NBC News released a new poll Sunday that found just 29% of American voters approve of Biden's policy related to Israel, which his administration has supplied with weapons without the approval of Congress at least twice since the war began in October. Forty-five percent of Democrats said they disapproved, compared to 44% who supported Biden's policy.
Despite the mounting evidence that a crucial voting bloc is deeply dissatisfied with Biden in the critical battleground state, when asked what the president's "message" to Arab American voters in Michigan was, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said only the "Israel has a right to defend itself" and that Biden is "heartbroken" over civilian casualties.
"These people are living in a fantasy world," said writer Dan Walden in response to the White House press secretary. "There is no world in which a Democrat wins Michigan without Arab American votes. The numbers simply do not exist."
At a press conference launching Listen to Michigan's effort on Tuesday, one organizer noted that former President Ronald Reagan made "one phone call" to Israeli officials in 1982 to pressure them to withdraw soldiers from Beirut.
"A complete cease-fire was declared," he said. "On the contrary, today President Joe Biden remains uncommitted to a cease-fire... As Democrats we will remember how Joe Biden is turning his back on humanity. He is ignoring our voice, the voice of the people."
Listen to Michigan's push for voters to select "uncommitted" on their ballots "is not an endorsement of Trump or a desire to see him return to power," emphasized the group. "The Democratic primary election is as an opportunity to question whether the incumbent genuinely holds the support of his own party's base. Michigan, a critical state in the general election and a key component of the Democratic coalition, is becoming a battleground where voters are expressing their disappointment and demanding a change in policy."
"We are sending the warning sign to President Biden and the Democratic Party now in February, before it's too late in November," the group said.
Abdullah Hammoud, the mayor of Dearborn, Michigan—where just over 54% of residents are of Middle Eastern or North African descent, according to the 2020 census—was among local Arab American leaders who declined to meet Biden when he visited the state last week, saying his community's "immediate demand is crystal clear: The Biden administration must call for a permanent cease-fire to a genocide it is defending and funding with our tax dollars."
Listen to Michigan said on its website that "Biden must earn" the votes of Michigan residents, hundreds of whom marched in support of Palestinian rights in the Detroit area when Biden made an appearance there last week.
"President Biden has been a successful candidate in the past by representing a broad coalition, but right now he's not representing the vast majority of Democrats who want a cease-fire and an end to our government's unconditional weapons funding of Israel," said the group. "He's not representing the young people who put him in office and turned out in the midterms—and are now out protesting his policies in the streets."
With nine months until the general election, said Listen to Michigan, Biden must immediately begin to work to "earn back our trust after financing war and genocide in Gaza"—a task that will "be difficult."
"There is a long time between now and November for Biden to change his policies and earn support from Democratic voters," said the group. "He must stop funding the Israeli government's atrocities against the Palestinian people."
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