DEARBORN, Michigan — The protest vote organized against President Joe Biden this week in the Great Lakes State asked the president to “Listen to Michigan.”
But despite members of Biden’s administration meeting with Arab and Muslim American community leaders this month, the initial response from the president’s campaign to Michigan’s primary Tuesday did not directly acknowledge the number of Democrats who marked themselves “uncommitted” to express their opposition to his approach to the Israel–Hamas war.
Asked for her reaction late Tuesday night on live TV, Listen to Michigan campaign manager Layla Elabed, who had aimed for 10,000 Democrats to mark themselves as “uncommitted” before almost 101,000 did so, criticized Biden’s statement as negligent.
“To once again alienate the voices of his core constituency, largely who put him in the White House in 2020, because this community largely supported Biden, based on the promises he made during his campaign trail,” Elabed told CNN. “We know that [former President Donald] Trump is not a friend to our community, and we know that he is not a friend to the anti-war, pro-ceasefire community, but, right now, we are appealing to Joe Biden as our president to act now before he risks losing his core constituency come November.”
The morning after, Arab and Muslim Americans in Michigan, home to one of the most concentrated populations of the community in the country, told the Washington Examiner that they “spoke loudly” on Tuesday, underscoring that the status quo of the Biden administration regarding Gaza and Palestinians “isn’t acceptable.”
“It appears to me that he will not win most of the uncommitted voters back by November,” said Dawud Walid, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations’s Michigan chapter, citing his organization’s own research.
CAIR’s automated telephone exit poll of 527 Muslim Michigan primary voters found that if the 2024 general election were held today, 40% of respondents would cast a ballot for an unnamed “other candidate,” followed by third-party candidate Cornel West (25%), likely Republican nominee Trump (13%), Biden (8%), Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (8%), and Jill Stein (7%).
Sameh Elhady, vice chairman of the Michigan Democratic Party’s Arab American caucus, agreed, “regardless [of] the response from the campaign,” that the community “sent a strong message” to Biden and that “we gained a momentum.”
“We also feel that we got support and solidarity from other groups like young voters and African Americans,” Elady said.
For Abandon Biden campaign Michigan co-chairwoman Samra’a Luqma, the president and his administration are and have been “walking around with blinders,” arguing “either they are oblivious and ambivalent, or they’re naive, or they’re purposely trying to ignore the fact that there is this fervor behind ousting Biden.”
Luqma reiterated that her organization’s goal remained the same: to encourage people not to vote for Biden in the general election.
“Seeing the Biden response, it is not just negligence,” Luqma said. “They are literally ignoring it. They’re almost dismissing, minimizing, and it really goes to show how much they’ve betrayed the base.”
Michigan State University political science assistant professor Nura Sediqe described the Arab and Muslim community as being in “a celebratory space” Wednesday, considering “they were able to have such an impact on the primary results.”
“Voters appear happy that they have been able to amplify their message in such an impactful way,” Sediqe said. “They feel like they have accomplished something and that it may ultimately push folks to take this voter bloc in Michigan more seriously.”
Two hours after the last polls closed in Michigan, Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic National Committee, and the Michigan Democratic Party shared statements on the primary, though none of them directly addressed the “uncommitted” campaign.
“I want to thank every Michigander who made their voice heard today,” Biden wrote Tuesday. “Exercising the right to vote and participating in our democracy is what makes America great.”
Prominent Democratic spokesman Waleed Shadid, who has worked for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), and the Justice Democrats, also noted that none of the statements used the word “Gaza.”
“In his statement about Michigan, Biden couldn’t care to mention the single biggest issue for the largest Arab American community in the United States,” Shadid wrote on social media.
In his statement about Michigan, Biden couldn’t care to mention the single biggest issue for the largest Arab American community in the United States. https://t.co/dL4Lv9bUQ7
— Waleed Shahid
(@_waleedshahid) February 28, 2024
Meanwhile, Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), chairwoman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, warned Biden and the administration that their “lack of attention and empathy” for the perspective of the Israel-Hamas war as a “moral issue” is breaking apart the fragile 2020 coalition that Biden will need in 2024.
“It has to be a dramatic policy and rhetorical shift from the president on this issue and a new strategy to rebuild a real partnership with progressives in multiple communities who are absolutely key to winning the election,” Jayapal told CNN.
Earlier Tuesday, the White House was asked about its outreach to the Arab and Muslim community amid the war during press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre and national security spokesman John Kirby‘s briefing.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
“First of all, you know that senior officials have gone to Michigan earlier this month to meet with Muslim and Arab Americans and we understand — right? — during a very deeply painful and personal moment,” Jean-Pierre said. “We understand what they’re going through. We understand what this means to this community. And the president understands that too.
“You heard the admiral talk about the hostage deal, the temporary ceasefire,” she continued. “That is why it is so critical and important to get that done. That is why you’ve seen this president and his administration work 24/7 to get that done, so we can get a temporary ceasefire, so we can get that humanitarian aid into Gaza, so that we can get those hostages — and we have American hostages that are part of that number as well. We want to get those hostages home to their families, to their loved ones.”