Kamala Harris Refused to Meet With Uncommitted About Gaza — and Uncommitted Refused to Endorse Her

The Uncommitted Movement announced Thursday that it would not endorse Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic candidate for president. 

“Vice President Harris’s unwillingness to shift on unconditional weapons policy or to even make a clear campaign statement in support of upholding existing U.S. and international human rights law has made it impossible for us to endorse her,” Uncommitted said in a statement released alongside a Thursday morning press conference.

The group said at the press conference that the move came after Harris refused to meet with Uncommitted. Uncommitted delegates gave Harris until September 16 to meet with them in the crucial swing state of Michigan. The deadline passed earlier this week. 

Uncommitted leaders and other observers were initially optimistic that Harris’s nomination would lead to a policy shift toward Israel and Gaza, even if they were sober about Harris’s strong pro-Israel record. As Harris cemented Democratic support behind her nomination, her campaign picked up its efforts to conduct outreach to Arab and Muslim voters.

Related

Kamala Harris Mentioned Palestinian Suffering — in the Passive Voice

After President Joe Biden withdrew as the Democratic nominee, Harris’s aides were wary of the public criticism that the administration had neglected Arab and Muslim constituents by sending billions of dollars of weapons to Israel. 

Uncommitted delegates and their supporters hoped that Harris would shift away from Biden’s unconditional support for Israel’s military. They also hoped that her willingness to call for a ceasefire before Biden and criticism of the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meant she would take a harder stance against Israel’s human rights abuses. 

During the press conference Thursday morning, Uncommitted co-founder Abbas Alawieh said the group sent a letter to Harris and her advisers after the Democratic National Convention expressing disappointment that there were no Palestinian speakers on the main stage, reiterating their policy demands, and pointing to opportunities for Harris to engage. Alawieh said the campaign responded in a letter on Sunday and said it could not do anything to respond to their requests at the moment.

“Vice President Harris and her team failed to take the opportunity to empower the Uncommitted Movement to endorse her and to mobilize voters for her reelection,” Alawieh said.

The Uncommitted delegates to the DNC withheld their support for Harris last month in Chicago to pressure her to commit to immediately stop sending weapons to Israel and secure a permanent ceasefire. Communication between Uncommitted and the Harris campaign became further strained after the DNC refused Uncommitted’s request to host a Palestinian American speaker on the main stage at the convention. 

“For months, we have urged Vice President Harris to shift her Gaza policy so we could mobilize voters in key states to save lives and our democracy.”

Uncommitted said that while the group would not endorse Harris, it continues to oppose a Donald Trump presidency and is not recommending a third-party vote in the presidential election for fear that it could inadvertently boost Trump’s advantage in the Electoral College. The group urged uncommitted voters to cast anti-Trump votes up and down the ballot. 

“For months, we have urged Vice President Harris to shift her Gaza policy so we could mobilize voters in key states to save lives and our democracy,” the group said in the Thursday morning statement. “The DNC and the Vice President’s campaign fumbled even a small gesture to unite our party ahead of November by rejecting the simple request for a Palestinian American speaker.”

Harris’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The tenor of Harris’s public remarks denouncing the killing of civilians in Palestine was one of the things that gave some Democrats hope that she might change course on Israel and Gaza.

In July, NBC reported that the White House had toned down Harris’s criticism of Israel in a planned speech given in March, but during her nomination acceptance speech last month, Harris reiterated that she would always support Israel’s right to defend itself. While she acknowledged the destruction of Gaza, she used the passive voice to describe it.

The decision by Uncommitted not to back Harris may not hamper her chances at winning the White House in November, but it bodes poorly for the progress Democrats had aspired to make in engaging disenchanted voters — not just their Arab and Muslim constituents. At least 740,000 people voted “uncommitted” in Democratic primaries earlier this year.

Shortly after Biden stepped down, Uncommitted voters who spoke to The Intercept said that no matter who the Democratic nominee was, they would withhold their votes unless the candidate makes significant policy changes to stop the killing of civilians in Gaza. 

Shaneez Hamed, an uncommitted voter in California who previously said policy change in Gaza was a red line to secure his vote, told The Intercept on Wednesday that he was not planning to vote for Harris in November. 

“She is not going to support an arms embargo against Israel,” Hamed wrote in an email. “She repeated the same old talking points about Israel/Hamas with no real change in policy. And this is all in addition to the happy parade her campaign has been doing for getting the endorsement of a war criminal such as Dick Cheney. So no, I will not be voting for Harris in November unless she changes her foreign policy. I’m tired of paying taxes for ‘the most lethal army in the world’ to go and bomb poor people of the global south.”

Another uncommitted voter who spoke to The Intercept in July said on Wednesday that he was planning to vote for Jill Stein.

“As of now, Harris has not earned my vote, no,” said Washington, D.C., voter Will Dawson. “I held out early on in the hopes that she’d appeal to the demands of the Democratic Party of whom the overwhelming majority have called for an immediate ceasefire with threat of full arms embargo/boycott if not met. And she has doubled down, saying there is nothing whatsoever the Israeli colony could do that would cease America’s support.”

Update: September 19, 2024, 11:20 a.m. ET
This story has been updated to include reporting and quotes from Uncommitted’s Thursday morning press conference.