As Kamala Harris prepares for the biggest moment of her political life at the Democratic National Convention this week, I’ve been reflecting on a recommendation I once got from her future former boss, President Biden.
When I was an intern at the White House in 2014, I had the opportunity to pose a question to then-Vice President Biden. How did he balance a seemingly endless list of priorities and problems without losing faith in the potential to solve them? He left me with some cogent counsel: “Pick the fights worth losing.” His point was that regardless of an outcome, the most existential threats to our society demand our opposition.
As I have watched the incalculable suffering of Palestinians over the last 10 months, I return to that advice from the same leader currently providing Israel with billions of dollars in arms to conduct its devastating war in Gaza and who wields the leverage to end it. I have marched with students, made calls to representatives in Congress and donated to relief funds. In response, I see seemingly unshakable support for Israel’s war from this administration.
Almost a decade after I had that exchange with Biden, I was invited to attend a reception at the home of Vice President Harris — just days before Biden dropped out of the presidential race and Harris became the leading candidate for the Democratic nomination. It was an event celebrating Black economic achievements, in many ways a self-congratulatory affair for the Biden-Harris administration. It has provided more money to historically Black colleges and universities than any administration in history, shrunk the unemployment rate for Black communities by half and cut Black child poverty by nearly half from 2020 to 2021.
Regardless of those wins, I declined the invitation. I knew I couldn’t comfortably celebrate with the vice president while the administration she serves continues to send more weapons to Israel than humanitarian aid to Gaza. Rather than the president demanding that Israel allow aid trucks to reach starving Palestinians, we air-dropped food and killed people as the packages crushed them from the sky. The U.S. attempt to create a by-sea route for humanitarian supplies — building a floating aid pier — was a $230-million failure that shut down after operating for just 25 days.
The appropriate solution to this manufactured humanitarian crisis is clear: a lasting cease-fire and unconditional access into and out of Gaza for aid and aid workers. Yet the administration refuses to apply the necessary pressure, such as ending arms transfers or sanctioning ultranationalist Israeli Cabinet members over settler violence in the West Bank.
The Black community in critical elections is called on to coalesce. We’re asked to champion candidates that look like us, come from our neighborhoods and share our values. Harris and I come from the same hometown, Oakland. She has been my attorney general, senator and vice president for more than a decade. Now that she’s the Democratic nominee, a mix of pride and disaffection swells in me as I consider my vote, and as we all uneasily hope for the cessation of bombings in Gaza.
Candidate Harris has an opportunity to take the advice I received from her boss 10 years ago. I hope she will earnestly reimagine our relationship with Israel to make more space for the dignity and humanity of the Palestinian people. The horror of Oct. 7 cannot justify the heinous war Israel is conducting, which includes acts and policies the International Court of Justice and a U.S. federal court have ruled may plausibly amount to genocide. Each day, it becomes clearer that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu refuses to negotiate in good faith to reach a cease-fire and return hostages. Meanwhile, the world watches in horror as the death toll continues to rise.
There is room for optimism. Harris has met with activists calling for a cease-fire and expressed sincere concern for the well-being of Palestinians in a way that Biden has failed to do. She can chart a new foreign policy that centers human rights at this critical moment. Americans would enthusiastically support hearing that message of peace at the convention this week.
As I have in each election with her name on the ballot, I will support Kamala Harris for president. But I know too many people who will not. This genocidal war demands more than gestures. She should embrace, not dismiss, an arms embargo against Israel, as many human rights organizations have called for. She should honor the Foreign Assistance Act and promise to cut off funding to Israeli military units that the State Department finds have grossly violated Palestinian human rights, as the Leahy law requires. She should support justice for the Palestinian people. Research shows that many Americans would be more likely to vote for her if she did so.
Demanding an end to the slaughter in Gaza and freedom for the Palestinian people is a fight worth losing. It is also by all means a fight we can win.
Ron Busby Jr. is the head of product at ByBlack, which provides support for Black-owned businesses, and lives in Oakland.