Samia Assed speaks about the ceasefire resolution adopted by the Democratic Party of New Mexico during a news conference on Monday in Albuquerque. (Photo by Austin Fisher / Source NM)
An overwhelming majority of the New Mexico Democratic Party’s membership this month voted in favor of a ceasefire in Israel’s war in Gaza, an end to the blockade on aid, a pause on U.S. military aid to Israel and the release of hostages on both sides.
After more than four months of back and forth between the party’s base and its leadership, and nine hours of debate on March 9, the statewide Pre-Primary Convention vote makes these policy positions part of the Democratic Party of New Mexico’s 2024 platform, and calls on the state’s congressional delegation and President Joe Biden’s administration to follow suit.
The State Central Committee, a group of about 500 grassroots party members elected by neighborhood precincts across New Mexico, are counted as delegates to the full Democratic Party convention, which passed the resolution with a 527-185 vote, or 74% in favor. Ninety-two delegates abstained.
“The majority of Democrats throughout the country support a ceasefire, but our political leaders are lagging behind,” Samia Assed said Monday at a news conference about the vote. “It’s past time for a political solution that leaders have ignored for too long. Over 13,000 Palestinian children have died, and 800,000 are starving. Enough is enough.”
Assed, a Palestinian-American, SCC member and head of the Southwest Coalition for Palestine, formally introduced the resolution to the state party in October. She and other SCC members said it took more than four months to get the ceasefire resolution to a SCC vote because of procedural delays.
“30,000 people have died in Gaza since we introduced the resolution,” Assed said.
The resolution is the Democratic Party of New Mexico’s final word for its 2024 election platform and there is no higher authority than the Pre-Primary Convention, SCC member Jane Yee said.
Yee is also chair of the Bernalillo County Democratic Party’s resolutions committee and helped write and carry the resolution through the state party’s policy platform process.
“What the United States government is standing for is settler colonialism,” Yee said. “There’s more in common with those of us in the grassroots of the Democratic Party — on the SCC and in the precincts and the wards — with the Native American people that also suffer from settler colonialism, than with the higher-ups, than with the governor or with the representatives.”
DPNM Policy on War in Gaza
The resolution calls on the party’s members, specifically the state’s congressional delegation, to demand the Biden administration do four things:
- Urgently call for and facilitate negotiations for a de-escalation and ceasefire.
- Immediately send and facilitate the delivery of adequate humanitarian aid including fuel, water, food, medical supplies, and medical personnel into Gaza.
- Pause all U.S. military aid to Israel and call upon all combatants’ allies to stop shipping weapons into the war zone.
- Secure the release of Israeli civilians being held hostage, and Palestinian political prisoners being detained, and allow foreign nationals freedom of movement.
“Hundreds of thousands of lives are at imminent risk if a ceasefire is not achieved and if humanitarian aid is not delivered immediately,” the resolution states. “The federal government holds immense diplomatic power to save Israeli and Palestinian lives.”
State Central Committee members were joined Monday by faith leaders and state lawmakers from Albuquerque, including Rep. Patricia Roybal-Caballero and Sens. Linda Lopez and Harold Pope, to support the resolution.
“To dispel the Israeli government’s rhetoric: this is not a war, it is a genocidal attack aimed at another land theft and the annihilation of the Palestinian people,” Roybal-Caballero said.
As a lawmaker, tribal member and Indigenous woman, Roybal-Caballero said she knows too well how settler colonialism steals lands, erases culture, language and traditions. She called for federal lawmakers and international decision makers to impose sanctions on Israel.
“I have an obligation to call out this inhumane genocide, intentionally killing innocent families, women, children, men, and medical personnel, all while justifying this genocide by calling it a war,” she said
A spokesperson for U.S. Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández said she has “pushed for more than a ceasefire,” including accountability for Israeli settler violence in the West Bank and a two-state solution. Leger Fernández said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s refusal to allow aid into Gaza and indiscriminate bombing of civilians are “immoral and unconscionable.”
“I oppose a military incursion into Rafah and decry the starvation that is imminent due to Netanyahu’s action,” Leger Fernández said. “The United States must continue to push for a ceasefire, and the House Republican leadership must allow us to vote on legislation to provide more humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza.”
Requests for comment on the state party’s resolution sent to the other four members of New Mexico’s congressional delegation were not returned by Monday evening.
New Mexico’s entire congressional delegation voted in favor of the spending bill Biden signed on Saturday which defunds UNRWA, the primary U.N. aid agency for Palestinians, for the next year during what the World Health Organization calls an “ imminent famine .”
A warning for November
The ceasefire resolution also exposes a rift between the New Mexico Democratic party’s base and its leadership. Yee said the resolution is just a first step taken by a grassroots group within the party.
“We have to lead our leaders to come to these kinds of realizations that we have reached ourselves in the last five months of debate in the grassroots,” she said.
Assed said her fellow Democrats who voted for the ceasefire resolution make up the party’s core, and elected officials must reflect their wishes.
“We represent the voters, and our representatives must hear our voices, our asks, our demands, and our warning for this vote in November,” Assed said.
State Central Committee member Mitchell Friedman, who also voted in favor of the resolution, encouraged people to vote “uncommitted” in the June Democratic primary. New Mexico law and the party’s rules requires the presidential ballot to include the option beneath the presidential candidates’ names. Uncommitted vote results are prominent in other state Democratic primary races, with some of the biggest showings in Michigan and Minnesota .
“This is a state with collective memory of genocide. This is a state with collective memory of apartheid conditions.” Friedman said. “The DNC knows, the media knows, that people who vote noncommitted right now are making a statement about this.”
Ceasefire proponents, Assed said, are not trying to disrupt or divide the Democratic Party, and do not want to see Donald Trump in office. Yee and SCC member Scotti Romberg, who helped write the ceasefire resolution, agreed that Biden would be a stronger candidate if he changed course.
“What President Biden and our congressional delegates have done has pushed away many Democrats, many Americans, many of our youth,” Assed said. “We want to make sure we win the election because we do not want to see Trump in office, we don’t want to see fascism.”
Correction Tuesday March 26 at 8:07 a.m.: This story has been corrected to accurately reflect which congress member responded with comment. The post NM Democratic Party adopts Gaza ceasefire policy appeared first on Source New Mexico .
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