Protest hit the polls this election day as a grassroots advocacy group is calling for Democrats to vote for an “uninstructed” delegation, rather than incumbent President Joe Biden, in today’s primary election to put pressure on the administration to call for a ceasefire in Gaza.
Signs are posted near polling locations around the state and advocates for the plan are working to inform the public on why they are doing this and what the end goal is. The hope, from Listen to Wisconsin, is to put pressure on politicians to act to end the ongoing war in Gaza.
“We’re just trying to represent what the voters here in Wisconsin truly want, because the majority of Americans want a ceasefire immediately,” said Yaseen Najeeb, organizer with Listen to Wisconsin. “We’ve tried calling, we’ve tried texting, tried faxing, we’ve tried every possible thing with representatives and elected officials, and we’re met with people ignoring us.”
Najeeb, a Milwaukee native and student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, like many others who took part in continued ceasefires protests, is taking a new avenue. Other states have taken the same approach as Michigan where over 100,000 voters cast their ballots as “uncommitted,”, the AP reported.
He points to the importance and power of the voters in the state and Biden’s narrow win in Wisconsin by just 20,000 votes. Listen to Wisconsin’s goal is to hit 20,000 voters to cast uninstructed ballots to match that number.
“We are a very critical swing state and without Wisconsin, generally, the candidate does not win,” Najeeb said. “If we hit that [goal], then we’re sending a clear message that you have little to no chance of winning in November.”
The group emphasizes that they still do not want Trump to win the general election in November, but wants to place a tangible pressure on politicians, especially the Biden Administration and the Democratic Party, if they “do not change their ways immediately,” Najeeb said.
“If Biden does not call for a ceasefire, the fault of who ends up in office in November is not on the people, but rather on the Democratic Party and the Biden Administration,” he said.
A previous version of this story identified the League of Women Voters as a proponent of the “uninstructed” vote. They are not; they provided information on what an “uninstructed” vote would mean.
