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- Thousands of Michigan voters chose “Irresponsible” over Biden in Tuesday’s Democratic primary.
- Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib and other activists have led a campaign to urge him to change course on Israel.
- Trump won Michigan by less than 11,000 votes in 2016, but activists say he is capitalizing on those votes.
President Joe Biden may have easily won Tuesday’s Michigan Democratic primary, but the result raises major red flags about his continued support for Israel.
As of 9:15 p.m. ET on Tuesday, more than 20,000 voters had cast “uncommitted” votes, accounting for more than 15% of the vote, according to Decision Desk headquarters.
This is largely the result of the “Listen to Michigan” campaign, which asks voters to withhold support for Biden until Israel enacts a permanent ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. The campaign is being led by Leila Elabd, the sister of Democratic Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, Michigan’s activist and only Palestinian-American lawmaker.
“I was proud to go in there today, pull the Democratic ballot, and vote ‘irresponsible,'” Tlaib said in a video message Tuesday. “President Biden isn’t listening to us. This is how we can use our democracy to say, ‘Listen, listen to Michigan.'”
The results illustrate the unique challenges Biden faces in the key battleground state in the midst of the war in Gaza, where some 30,000 Palestinians have been killed since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack.
Dearborn and the Detroit metropolitan area are home to tens of thousands of Muslim and Arab Americans, some of whom have had family members murdered in recent months.
“President Biden funded a bomb that was dropped on the families of people here in Michigan,” Ellabed said in a statement Monday. “Thousands of Michigan Democrats who voted for Biden in 2020 now feel completely betrayed.”
It remains unclear how many “committed” voters will continue to withhold their support for Biden in the general election, but organizers say it is the president’s responsibility to garner support and hope Biden wins. But they claim it’s not their fault. In the end, Michigan lost the general election to former President Donald Trump.
Abbas Allawi, a spokesperson for Listen to Michigan, said in an earlier press conference that “President Biden himself, by failing to call for a cease-fire, has placed the presidency in the hands of Donald Trump and his white supremacist allies.” We are on track to hand it over to the government.” Month.
Michigan organizers had set an official goal of 10,000 votes. This is about the same as Trump’s margin of 10,700 votes in 2016. Biden defeated Trump in the state in 2020 by more than 150,000 votes.
Prior to Tuesday’s primary election, Biden campaign officials pointed out that approximately 20,000 voters chose “non-commitment” in the recent presidential primary election, although circumstances vary.
“Uncommitted” voters accounted for less than 2% of recent competitive primaries, including 19,106 uncommitted voters in 2020 and 21,601 uncommitted voters in 2016.
In 2012, when President Barack Obama faced a noncompetitive reelection bid, there was no organized effort to encourage voters to vote blank, but 20,833 people voted anyway, accounting for 10.7% of the vote. Ta.
Four years ago, when Mr. Obama did not appear on the ballot, many of his supporters voted outright for his opponent, Hillary Clinton, who won 238,168 votes, about 40% of the electorate. Obtained.
The campaign said in a memo to reporters Monday that it spent about $200,000 on mail and digital advertising, organizing and other expenses.
The group sought to highlight the difficult nature of the effort, saying some sympathetic Democratic organizations, elected officials and operatives have distanced themselves from the campaign “for fear of retaliation from the Democratic Party establishment.” he claimed.
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