Representative Rashida Tlaib, what exactly did you accomplish by refusing to endorse VP Harris?

[lostincalifornia]

"US announces it will deny visa to Palestinian Authority president and other officials ahead of UN General Assembly

The United States is denying a visa to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas for next month’s UN General Assembly – a significant and controverisal move ahead of the global summit where multiple countries are expected to recognize a Palestinian state.

The State Department announced Friday it is “denying and revoking visas” from members of the Palestinian Authority (PA) & Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).

A State Department official confirmed that “Abbas is affected by this action along with approximately 80 other PA officials.”

According to Friday’s announcement from the State Department, the Palestinian Authority’s Mission to the UN “will receive waivers per the UN Headquarters Agreement.”

https://www.cnn.com/2025/08/29/politics/us-denying-visas-palestinian-officials

Not sure they would negotiate with based on that.

[msongs]

1. palestinians oughta try and crash the party anyway.maybe talib could be their spokesperson nt

[lostincalifornia]

3. I doubt they will even get out of the airport with the orange dictator in charge.

[Autumn]

2. In the end it didn't matter she didn't endorse her. Jeffries has not endorsed

Zohran Mamdani. Does that upset you?

[lostincalifornia]

5. Big difference. The mayor of a city and the President of the United States. Mamdani is going to be Mayor of NY,

according to the latest polls, and who he is running against.

2024, as 2016, there was much more at stake. We lost the supreme court because of that, and in case you haven't noticed trump is very close to test unitary executive privilege with THIS supreme court, which means we will effectively have a dictator just before the midterms unless the Supreme Court, or the voters are able to stop it, and based on the previous actions of the supreme court, I don't hold out too much hope for them.

She influenced a lot of voters in the critical swing states of Michigan and Wisconsin, and her lack of endorsement, was a critical issue for many voters in Michigan.

I am absolutely convinced that VP Harris would have done everything differently, and brought all parties back to the negotiating table, because that was part of her four point plan.

[Autumn]

10. No difference at all. You either endorse or you don't. It's a personal choice. nt

[Polybius]

19. A President an Mayor are a huge difference

Put it like this:

Worse that can happen in 2024 presidential race: Trump gets elected President.
Worse that can happen in 2025 NYC mayoral race: Cuomo gets elected Mayor.

See the difference now? One is a tragedy, while the other isn't even a big deal.

[lostincalifornia]

24. More than a tragedy. One can completely dismantle our Democracy, and frankly is in the process of doing so

with his goal of unitary executive theory, which this supreme court very well might grant him.

Everything else will actually be moot if that happens.

[sheshe2]

52. I would bet ya, that half the country...

Could not name their citys mayor without looking it up.

[lostincalifornia]

59. It wouldn't surprise me.

[Autumn]

26. A President an Mayor are very different. An endorsement remains the same,

It's a persoal choice to give it or not. No one is owed an endorsement. Just ask Jefferies.

[Hekate]

31. If you don't know the difference between a city mayor & the President of the US, it's hard to know what to say at all

I’m really quite sorry for your lack of perspective.

[betsuni]

32. I have aspirin if you need some, keep it handy for these occasions.

I know I just shouldn't look but ...

[Hekate]

34. Thanks, I'll have some

[Autumn]

51. I feel the same. The lack of perspective many people have is stunning.

But I sure as hell don't feel sorry for them. Your sympathy is not needed,. My perspective is just fine.

[Nixie]

60. If you're so fine with everything, then just answer the question,

What did Tlaib accomplish by refusing to endorse Harris??

That’s what this thread’s about. Not sidetracks into non-issues about Jeffries, who has not organized hordes to refuse to vote for Momdani as Tlaib did against Harris.

The article starts with Palestinians being denied rights by president fvckface. Yet you think your perspective is just fine. As long as some Democratic politician gets a “message” no vote somewhere?

[Hekate]

33. So, is there "a dime's worth of difference" between the consequences?

[Autumn]

55. I'm not talking about "consequences" I'm talking about a woman making a

personal choice to endorse another person that she has a fundamental disagreement with or not. It's more or less what a woman's conscience allows her to do. I know I follow my conscience and I'm good with that.

[sheshe2]

9. Not even a close comparison.

Congress person endorsement of a Presidential Candidate. vs Congress person endorsement of a Mayoral Candidate.

[Autumn]

11. Not a bit of difference between an endorsement for a president or a congress person.

An endorsement is a personal choice. They are not required by law. It was her choice.

[mcar]

13. You're comparing apples to lawn furniture

Last edited Sun Aug 31, 2025, 09:29 AM - Edit history (1)

Tlaib refused to endorse the presidential nominee of her party - presidential.

Mamdani is a mayoral candidate. Whether a congressman endorses him is of no moment.

[lapucelle]

27. "Cheese and chalk..."

[dsc]

43. Jeffries is a House Member who lives in the city in question

and his non endorsement is out of line. You can't be blue no matter who only when convenient.

[dsc]

48. Jeffries represents New York not New Jersey

https://jeffries.house.gov/

https://www.congress.gov/member/district/hakeem-jeffries/J000294

He represents Kings county New York.

[JI7]

14. Republican has no chance of winning NYC Mayors race

[Autumn]

18. That's what I think too, he's got it . But Jefferies still won't endorse him.

So there's that

[Polybius]

20. True

I'd say Andrew Cuomo has a small chance, however. Especially if Adams drops out, since he can't win.

[lapucelle]

30. How do you know that it didn't matter?

We know that it didn’t matter that Tlaib failed to endorse Joe Biden in 2020 because he won that election.

How do you know that Tlaib’s failure to endorse Kamala Harris wasn’t a factor in our 2024 loss of the White House?

[sheshe2]

54. It wasn't just her failure to endorse.

She told her constituents to vote 'uncommitted' in Joe's primary ..........and THAT carried right on through Kamala's run. The most important election of our lifetime.

[Fiendish Thingy]

4. She probably accomplished her reelection

Or would you have preferred a Republican take her seat?

[lostincalifornia]

6. Highly unlikely that a republican would have taken her seat.

[BannonsLiver]

21. You think a Republican was going to win in a district that she won?

Not happening.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

29. I would have preferred that she had a primary opponent.

There was one, but somehow he didn't make it onto the primary ballot.

[Oopsie Daisy]

7. A question I've wanted to ask often.

[Tribetime]

8. Every time on t v I see her I turn the channel

[mcar]

12. And where are her protests now?

In fact, why isn't anyone protesting "Genocide Don?" Because it doesn't rhyme?

[LetMyPeopleVote]

38. Netanyahu Gambled on a Trump Presidency. Will It Pay Off?

With trump back in power, Bibi will be free to do what he wants in Gaza

Link to tweet

https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/podcasts/2024-11-06/ty-article-podcast/netanyahu-gambled-on-a-trump-presidency-will-it-pay-off/00000193-01b9-dc77-adb3-9bbbf9ee0000

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's "gamble" on extending the war in Gaza in anticipation of Donald Trump winning the U.S. election seems to have paid off, according to Haaretz senior military analyst Amos Harel.

In conversation with Haaretz Podcast host Allison Kaplan Sommer, Harel said that Netanyahu "kept promising total victory, what he actually had was sort of a Forever War. It was not forever, but he was waiting for November, and for January 20 and for his friend Trump to be back in the White House."

What is the Israeli premier hoping to get out of his bet? Harel believes that in renewing the Bibi-Trump bromance, Netanyahu believes he can win U.S. support for measures that will stop his criminal trial - Trump after all, will certainly sympathize - and move ahead with the judicial coup that will damage Israeli democracy.

In the security and military arena, the Israeli leader aspires to achieve "more aggressive goals in the region, whether it's striking Iran or persuading the Americans to strike Iran, or pushing forward against the Palestinians and against Hezbollah and Lebanon."

[Cha]

39. That's Quite an "accomplishment"

[JI7]

15. She got what she wanted. The current situation is what she wants

along with the rest of the "genocide joe" crowd.

[AloeVera]

42. You think she wanted the continued slaughter and starvation of her own people? I see. N/ T

[JI7]

16. Do you really think she is upset by this ?

[LeftInTX]

49. I have no idea. She knew what she was doing. Did she not think that Trump would win?

Did she just assume Kamala would be elected and she could be a thorn in her side? That would be the most likely reason.


Ironically our DSA chapter recommended EVERY Democrat who was on our city's ballot this May.... They endorsed 3 and recommended all the others. Maybe they realized that actions have consequences.....

[LeftInTX]

50. I have no idea. She knew what she was doing. Did she not think that Trump would win?

Did she just assume Kamala would be elected and she could be a thorn in her side? That would be the most likely reason.


Ironically our DSA chapter recommended EVERY Democrat who was on our city's ballot this May.... They endorsed 3 and recommended all the others. Maybe they realized that actions have consequences.....

[AloeVera]

56. What I really think is that implying a Palestinian Dem Rep is a psychopath who wants her own people erased....

Is kind of...unbelievable? I'm holding back what I really REALLY think, though.

[KentuckyWoman]

17. Serious question

How many people didn't vote or voted Trump because of Tlaib?

[sheshe2]

23. To many

DT articulated his vision to turn Gaza into the “Riviera of the Middle East,” He said the quiet part out LOUD and made clear his intentions.

While many remain fixated and angry with Trump’s comments that the U.S. should take over Gaza, and Palestinians should resettle elsewhere, what is being ignored is how a majority of Arab American voters in Michigan helped put him in the White House.

In the months leading up to the 2024 election, Arab Americans upset with former President Joe Biden’s response to the war in Gaza, decided to punish Democrats.

They chose Trump, denying Vice President Kamala Harris, the first Black woman to be a presidential nominee, their support. Among them were the Arab American mayors of Hamtramck and Dearborn Heights, Amer Ghalib and Bill Bazzi respectively.

Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian American member of Congress, refused to endorse Harris. Months earlier, she and her allies led the uncommitted vote during the presidential primary.

https://www.detroitnews.com/story/opinion/columnists/bankole-thompson/2025/02/09/thompson-arab-americans-in-political-quandary-after-backing-trump/78330056007/

[MichMan]

28. No one knows how much Tlaib's lack of an endorsement affected those votes

Then, even if Harris had won Michigan, that still wouldn't have made her president.

[Hekate]

35. As with Hillary, the election was lost on the margins, in places where the 3rd party candidate(s) won...

Jill Stein took districts here and there, crucial places she’d concentrated her efforts against Hillary. By the numbers, not so much — until you got to the Electoral College tally.

And so it goes. Our enemies (such as Jill Stein, who was photographed at dinner in Moscow with Vlad Putin and Gen. Flynn, just so you understand why I call her an enemy) ended up throwing the election to Donald Trump on the first pass.

Then again with those who convinced the angry and I’m sure well-meaning “uncommitteds” et al. this time around. Slim, slim margins on the slim, slim edges, aimed at skewing the Electoral College tally.

[MichMan]

44. The OP was specifically referring to Tlaib

Her lack of an endorsement in Michigan probably affected her district at some level, but I seriously doubt it had anything to do with candidates like Stein getting votes in all the other swing states.

Only a miniscule fraction of voters in states like Wisconsin , Pennsylvania or Georgia have ever even heard of her. Endorsements don't mean much. Have you ever decided to vote for someone based on someone else's endorsement?

[Hekate]

45. Heh. "Endorsements don't mean much. " In this thread we have someone who will never forgive...

…a US Senator from New Jersey for not jumping into the New York Mayoral race with a fiery endorsement of a New Yorker. Because reasons. And the poster kept that unwavering point of view all the way thru a fairly long discussion.

It’s all in one’s point of view I guess. Personally, after being a Democrat and a voter since I cut my teeth on the Eugene McCathy campaign in 1968, there are a few sources I like to read and compare for endorsements (including the Democratic Party) , candidate statements and accomplishments, some politically astute commentators. I consider what they all have to say and check in with my own thoughts and feelings. I sure as hell don’t expect to meet a presidential candidate in a donut shop in a state that has as many people as Canada, and an 840 mile coastline.

Anyway — “an” endorsement? Unlikely to sway me. But apparently it’s real important to some, and part of a purity test.

[gulliver]

22. It probably helped Harris a lot.

Obviously not enough. Maybe if Tlaib had campaigned against Harris, then we would have done better.

I fairly strongly disagree with the politics of the people who refer to themselves as Palestinians. They're basically far right conservatives, and I'm a liberal.

[BellyOfTheBeast]

40. Many Palestinians are on the left.

The majority of political parties in Palestine are left-wing. The ruling party in Ramallah is center-left.

[gulliver]

57. It doesn't matter if you're "economically leftish" if you're nutso righty socially

...and approving of the warlike, and dehumanizingly callous and intolerant toward others of different religious beliefs...

But let's hear the "left-leaning" Palestinian point of view from one of their female, non-Muslim, or gay spokespeople before we decide.

[BellyOfTheBeast]

58. Orientialism bs.

This is full of hasbara lies to dehumanize the Palestinian people. The Palestinian people are a diverse group who are like other ethnically groups. Muslims make up the religious majority of Palestine, but you will find Christians and secular folks living in the country. It is home to the oldest Christian civilization in the world.

You want to talk warlike societies look no further than Israel, where it’s mandatory to serve in the IDF. Where they can get away with genocide through the backing of the world’s biggest empire in the United States of America. Neighboring nations in the region can be attacked on a random basis. A settler colonial entity no different than the former apartheid nation of Rhodesia.

Yes, what a “left” society that is. Watch the Empire Files episode on Israeli society to see such socially tolerant people.

[betsuni]

25. Trump presidency consequences (death, chaos, destruction, suffering) not important.

Important is whipping up disgust and hate against Democrats with scary stories of the horrible corrupt warmongery establishment things they might do and all the wonderful things they refuse to do, the elections the DNC rigs because AIPAC gave them five dollars, how they are the true roadblock to progress, to revolution. They must be punished *thrill runs up revolutionary's leg.*

The transformative cleansing revolution.

[Duncan Grant]

36. And what about all those lazy white Christians who couldn't be bothered to vote? (/s)

Tlaib is such an insignificant footnote in the Harris loss — and the current UN General Assembly visa denial story. I have to wonder what the real motive is whenever I see one of these threads. Since that’s subjective, I’ll keep it to myself.

Personally, I can’t forget the millions upon millions of white Christian people who couldn’t be bothered to even cast a vote. Seems to me “those people” deserve ire and ongoing examination. The same people, by the way, who are woefully uninformed about the genocide in Gaza — and the key political players responsible. The same people, who denied a Harris Administration a mandate to prioritize Palestinian human rights? (We’ll never really know how that would have played out…)

Conflating Tlaib with this story is odd, considering her limited authority and power. Are you a Palestinian who believes Tlaib ruined this opportunity for Palestinian autonomy — or is this just an opportunity to take a jab at her?

[AloeVera]

41. The motive should be obvious.

It's the same old FAFO gloating and scapegoating. Very disturbing. It also serves to deflect from the true reason for Harris' loss which is that millions stayed home precisely because of Gaza.

[Autumn]

53. Rec for this .

[LetMyPeopleVote]

37. MaddowBlog-Trump's new plan to 'take over' Gaza condemned as 'deranged'

The president didn’t need yet another avoidable international incident. With his radical plan to "own" the Gaza Strip, he managed to create one anyway.

As Trump announces a plan to "own" Gaza, and possibly deploy troops to achieve his goal, spare a thought for those voters who took seriously the idea that the Republican was the candidate of foreign policy restraint. www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddo...

— Steve Benen (@stevebenen.com) 2025-02-05T14:03:55.704Z

https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/trump-gaza-takeover-netanyahu-condemned-rcna190762

On the contrary, earlier in the week, Trump abandoned decades of bipartisan U.S. foreign policy and publicly declared his belief that Palestinians should leave the Gaza Strip to “clean out” the enclave. The Washington Post’s David Ignatius noted soon after that the American president’s comments “astonished moderate Arab leaders who had been looking forward to working with him.”

A week later, as NBC News reported, the Republican went much further down the same radical path:

President Donald Trump, speaking at a White House news conference Tuesday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, announced that the U.S. would seek ownership of the war-torn Gaza Strip after saying Palestinians have no choice but to leave their homes there. “We’ll own it,” Trump said of Gaza.

The Republican, at the same press conference, described his vision of the United States maintaining a “long-term ownership position” of Gaza......

Trump was also asked at the same press conference whether he has the legal authority to take a sovereign territory. He never quite got around to answering the question.

Link to tweet

The president might’ve struggled with this point because, according to experts in international law, his plan is illegal.

The reactions on Capitol Hill were far from positive. Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina was willing to go out on a limb and call Trump’s plan “problematic,” but Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia was far more direct, describing the proposal as “deranged” and “nuts.”

trump and Bibi are still looking for a place to deport all residents of Gaza. I wonder how these voters feel about this plan