The Delicate Dance Between Kamala Harris And Pro-Palestinian Activists

Not long after Kamala Harris took over the Democratic campaign from President Joe Biden, she made her first stop in Michigan at the top of the ticket and began a one-step-forward, two-steps-back dance with the Uncommitted movement. The dance seemingly ended Thursday, when the group announced it would not be endorsing Harris’ presidential run.

Before a rally Aug. 7 in Detroit, the campaign included two leaders from the pro-Palestinian Uncommitted movement in a photo line with Harris. It was a big opportunity for the group, which convinced hundreds of thousands of Democratic primary voters to vote “uncommitted” rather than support Biden earlier in the year.

Like other critics of Israel’s U.S.-backed offensive in Gaza, Uncommitted wanted the Democratic Party to use American leverage over right-wing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to push him to end the conflict, which has killed more than 40,000 Palestinians, more than 1,700 Israelis and risked a broader war. Unlike Biden, a self-proclaimed Zionist with a history of sending and expanding U.S. military support for Israel largely regardless of its conduct, Harris might agree with them that a change in U.S. policy was the only way to end the war, they hoped.

“I’m a DNC delegate and I appreciate your leadership,” Abbas Alawieh, the group’s co-founder and a former chief of staff to Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.), said he told her. “We want to support you, Vice President Harris, and our voters need to see you turn a new page on Gaza policy that includes embracing an arms embargo to save lives. Can we meet to discuss this urgent need for an arms embargo?”

In the same news release, the group said Harris “shared her sympathies and expressed an openness to a meeting with Uncommitted leaders to discuss an arms embargo.” Harris’ campaign had a different version of events, one where Harris simply “reaffirmed that her campaign will continue to engage” Muslim and Arab leaders.

Ardent pro-Israel voices quickly challenged Harris’ purported consideration of the idea — hinting at the firestorm it could create for her nascent candidacy among Israel backers, from voters to donors.

The next morning, Harris’ national security adviser Phil Gordon denied the suggestion she would consider halting American weapons for Israel. The statement put her in direct opposition to the rallying cry of Uncommitted and its allies: “Not Another Bomb.”

In the interim, a different group of pro-Palestinian protesters interrupted her rally speech. “Kamala, Kamala, you can’t hide! We won’t vote for genocide,” they chanted. As the protests continued, Harris rebuked the demonstrators: “You know what? If you want Donald Trump to win, then say that. Otherwise, I’m speaking.”

The events of those 24 hours encapsulated a monthslong process in which the Democratic campaign and the movement seemingly tried to get to a place of mutual understanding, but mistrust and misaligned goals prevented a full alliance.

Uncommitted’s statement on Thursday, however, warned supporters not to back former president Trump nor Green Party nominee Jill Stein, who has labored to win over antiwar voters. That, at least, was a victory for the Harris campaign and a practical result of the difficult position the Uncommitted movement is in: trying to find a president who would openly take on the Israeli government.

Starting seven months ago, the possibility of pro-Palestinian votes endangering a Democratic victory in November became a major topic of political discourse.

Opponents of U.S. support for the Israeli invasion of Gaza secured especially strong showings during primaries in Michigan and Minnesota, two closely watched and competitive states. The Biden administration failed to clinch a ceasefire deal that would end the bombing and displacement of Palestinians and bring home hostages captured in the Oct. 7 attack by the Gaza-based militant group Hamas. That made criticism of its strategy even stronger.

Concerns grew among Democrats that groups of voters especially alarmed by U.S. policy, like Arab and Muslim Americans and younger voters, could sit out the election. Biden, then the nominee, was wholly reliant on winning Michigan to have any chance of reelection. And anything to get him extra votes in the state seemingly had to be on the table.

Harris’ ascent in July gave pro-Palestinian activists particular hope for change, given her past expressions of sympathy for Gaza’s suffering and the simple fact of no longer having to contend with Biden.

But while she and her team engaged with Uncommitted activists and their allies, they did not budge on policy — specifically the administration’s commitment to providing military supplies for Israel with lenient oversight. The pro-Palestinian movement and a range of foreign policy experts maintain that without leveraging at least some U.S. aid, a timely ceasefire is impossible.

Harris and her team also chose not to meaningfully acknowledge the Uncommitted movement, a loose coalition of organizers and political operatives focused on advocacy among Democratic-leaning voters. Despite weeks of increasingly intense advocacy by Uncommitted and partners in broader Democratic circles, the Democratic National Convention last month declined to provide speaking time to a Palestinian American. Following the convention, Uncommitted wrote to the campaign asking Harris and senior staff to set up meetings with voters with personal ties to the conflict and sent along policy requests.

The Harris campaign did not accept, Alawieh said at a Thursday news conference.

“We have done everything in our power to try and empower the vice president’s campaign to mobilize voters, especially in Michigan, who feel deeply betrayed by the Democratic Party’s continued support of weapons to the Israeli military that’s using them to harm and kill civilians. That offer to mobilize voters has been rejected by the vice president’s team.”

A Harris campaign spokesperson said Harris had met with Palestinian Americans, if not the Uncommitted movement itself: “She has met with Palestinian Americans who have lost family in Gaza and met with faith leaders and doctors returning from Gaza to hear firsthand experiences,” the spokesperson wrote in an email.

The Harris campaign’s choice amounts to a bet that it can minimize progressive dissent in a way it could not minimize the blowback if Harris became more confrontational toward Netanyahu.

“You are less than 60 days out from an election. You are as close to a dead heat as you could possibly get,” said a senior Michigan Democratic strategist with ties to the Harris campaign who requested anonymity to speak freely. “Any major change in any policy is risky, but one that has the potential to upend the electoral coalition that you’ve put together in all your battleground states to essentially have a policy that would be more accepted in one part of a specific region in one state is especially risky.”

Those who might be at risk of defecting to Trump include, but are not limited to, some centrist, pro-Israel Jewish voters in states like Pennsylvania.

What’s more, counting on the left’s relative flexibility appears to have paid off for the Harris campaign. Even though Uncommitted leaders declined to endorse Harris, they warned supporters against voting for Trump, who they said would “accelerate the killing,” and for third-party candidates who could “inadvertently” help him win in swing states.

In the weeks leading up to the election, the group will continue “engaging in voter education about Trump and third parties” and working “to challenge both Trump’s extremism and also Harris’s status quo,” Uncommitted leader Lexis Zeidan said.

Harris allies, who feared a signal to vote for Stein, considered the development a victory.

From the campaign’s point of view, numbers back up the choice to keep relatively aloof from Uncommitted.

Harris can boast relative polling strength in Michigan, which has the biggest Arab American community in a swing state, and among young people and progressive voters overall.

She currently leads Trump by over 2 points in Michigan, according to 538’s polling average, in a significant improvement over Biden’s standing in the state before his withdrawal.

Additionally, Harris has consolidated support among key Democratic constituencies who are more sympathetic to the Palestinian cause. Nationwide, Harris leads Trump among voters younger than 35 by 13 percentage points — a 24-point uptick from Biden’s position in June, according to a Suffolk University/USA Today poll out in late August. And she now leads among Black voters by 64 points — a 17-point increase from Biden’s margin, the same poll found.

“At least from an electoral standpoint, where it was really starting to be a problem is because it was becoming a broader issue in the progressive community, especially with younger voters,” the Michigan strategist said. “And with Harris, it doesn’t seem to be as critical for them as an issue in voting in November, whether that’s because now we have a binary choice, or because there’s other issues at play that are exciting young voters, particularly young women.”

Emphasizing his opposition to Trump, Uncommitted’s Alawieh told reporters he still feels the Harris team is missing an opportunity and “looking rightward” rather than courting critics of the Gaza campaign. “I sure hope they’re not wrong about that,” he said.

Harris seems to have benefited from a contrast with Biden, who enraged pro-Palestinian activists with not just his policy but also comments like amplifying the now-debunked claims of Hamas beheading babies and questioning civilian casualty figures from Gaza’s ministry of health.

The widespread belief she is more open-minded on the issue and can be influenced by advocacy helps undercut the argument from those like Stein, who say Gaza war critics cannot trust Democrats to change course and should use their votes to punish the party and, in the long term, America’s two-party political system.

Alawieh summed up the thinking in human terms on Thursday.

“My priority is not punishing Harris. I do not care if Harris is punished. I care if our movement is well-positioned to save some lives because some of those lives happen to be real human beings who I know,” he said. “And so any suggestion that we should just punish the party because, ‘Who cares if we get Trump — at least they’ll learn a lesson.’ That lesson would be in the form of more human beings who we know and love. And if you’re willing to get some satisfaction out of feeling like you punish Harris and that will help you sleep at night, I can respect that. For me, in order for me to try and start sleeping at night, I need to know that I’m blocking Donald Trump.”

He self-identifies as a Harris voter while defining his chief task as pushing her and Biden to alter U.S. policy on the war now. Yet even fellow Uncommitted leader Layla Elabed, who said she does not currently plan to vote for Harris, said she dreads the idea of a second Trump presidency.

“We hope that they’re right — that they can win this race against Donald Trump without voters who feel that Gaza is a top issue for them,” Elabed said.

While extending sympathy to Israeli hostage families and emphasizing solidarity with the country in the face of enemies from Hamas to Iran, Harris frequently affirms the Palestinian right to “self-determination” and signals disapproval of how Israel is prosecuting its Gaza campaign.

Israel “has a right to defend itself. We would,” she said on CNN in late August. “And how it does so matters. Far too many innocent Palestinians have been killed.”

On Tuesday, at a National Association of Black Journalists event, Harris emphasized she was “entirely supportive” of Biden’s single decision over the course of the war to limit military assistance for Israel: his decision to halt a shipment of devastating 2,000-pound bombs, a move she explicitly described as exercising “leverage” over Israel.

James Zogby, the founder of the Arab American Institute, said he is in regular contact with both Harris’ campaign staff and her White House team. In those conversations, he has found those aides, including Gordon, to be more interested than Biden’s team ever was in the U.S. playing a more balanced role in Israeli-Palestinian affairs.

“The tenor of the discussion, like the tenor of her statements, has been fundamentally different than those of President Biden, different in tone, different in concern and different in worldview. While they haven’t specifically said, ‘We’ll do this instead of that,’ I have a sense. I don’t have a commitment,” he said. “And I wish they would do something. I think there are things that they can do that would do more to send the message of a different direction.”

Short of an endorsement for an arms embargo — a pie-in-the-sky possibility — Zogby suggested Harris could make clear she sees Israel as violating U.S. laws prohibiting the use of American weapons for war crimes, and that she would enforce those laws accordingly.

Zogby and other skeptics of current Gaza policy have gathered their own data to argue a policy shift would be in Harris’ self-interest.

The Arab American Institute conducted polling in late July and early August showing that Americans planning to vote for Trump or a third-party candidate were more likely to support Harris if she were to “demand an immediate ceasefire and allow unimpeded humanitarian aid into Gaza.” Using those voters’ share of the electorate, the organization concluded that taking that stance would allow Harris’ overall national support to go from 44% to as much as 50%.

“The more dangerous problem for the Harris campaign is not that [pro-Palestinian voters] vote for Jill Stein, it’s that they don’t vote,” Zogby said. “They’re very distraught.”

On Friday, a coalition of Muslim American organizations, including the political arm of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, issued a statement urging Muslims to vote in November only for candidates who have embraced an Israel arms embargo, name-checking Stein.

But even Zogby’s survey found that just 7% of voters surveyed across the country see “the crisis in Gaza” as one of their top three issues.

That tracks with other surveys suggesting that while the voting public has grown more sympathetic to the Palestinian cause, it does not yet rate as a high priority, including among young people.

Republicans are making a clear attempt to capitalize on the issue, running digital ads targeted at Muslim communities in Michigan that play up pro-Israel statements from Harris. Some of the ads, which are paid for by a group with ties to Trump adviser Ric Grenell, have used antisemitic tropes when discussing Harris’ Jewish husband, Doug Emhoff.

The Harris campaign is now countering those spots with ads of their own featuring footage of Harris promising she “will not be silent” about Palestinian pain.

Muslim and Arab voters ultimately make up a small portion of the electorate even in Michigan. And Harris’ campaign can count on continued vocal support by some in the community. Salima Suswell, the founder of the Black Muslim Leadership Council, endorsed Harris in August after declining to endorse Biden. While Suswell said the group still has deep concerns over the administration’s handling of Gaza, she pointed to Harris’ promises to combat gun violence, promote affordable housing and boost small businesses.

“Muslims care a lot about what’s happening in Gaza, and that’s across the community, South Asian Muslims, Arab Muslims, Black Muslims,” she said. “With that being said, there are also domestic policy issues that we have to balance that are important to our community as well.”

Still, Suswell said she understands why the Uncommitted leaders made their choice.

“They have a community and a base that they serve, and I think they have to respect the feelings of that community,” she said. “And there is still a lot of pain.”