The DNC Tried to Silence Her. Here’s Her Plan After Voting for Harris

Ruwa Romman is a Georgia state representative. She is the first Muslim woman elected to the Georgia state House and first Palestinian elected to any public office in the state’s history. 

I landed back home two days after I was initially supposed to, after a whirlwind week at the Democratic National Convention, where not a single Palestinian was allowed a speaking role on stage. While many have now seen me read my leaked speech, the tears that escaped my eyes were not about being rejected. Frankly, my expectations of the DNC have always been nonexistent. When the Uncommitted Movement team let me know I was one of the names they had submitted, I knew that we would be more likely exposing the structural racism in the party than actually getting anyone on that stage. To me, it simply served as an important reminder of all the work left to do to dismantle the hierarchy in the party that places the lives of Palestinians below everyone else. So no, I didn’t cry because the DNC showed the nation the structural racism against Palestinians. I cried because I deeply missed my grandfather. 

My grandfather passed away in 2021, a few weeks before an article was published that suggested I was considering running for office (I wasn’t). I had just seen him the week prior and could not understand how he was gone. I found myself drowning in shock and grief.

When my Arab, Muslim, and organizing communities began pushing me to run, I vividly remember telling a family friend that as a Palestinian, I had no idea if I could bear advocating on any issues related to Palestinians with this gaping wound inside of me. He assured me that this role would be focused on the state level and convinced me that there is so much good work that can be done. After all, these were issues I’ve advocated for nearly a decade on like expanding Medicaid, fully funding education, and protecting our right to vote. He insisted that I couldn’t let this opportunity go.

With the promise of working to help communities I advocate for, growing pressure, and a devastating grief in my heart, I surprised even myself and launched our campaign. 

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When we won, the media attention was beyond overwhelming. In hindsight, I should have prepared for it, but I didn’t fully grasp the historic nature of my candidacy. To me, I was running to put public service back into politics and help Georgians any way that I could. I just happened to be Muslim and Palestinian.

When I got off that plane after the DNC, I once again found myself thinking about how I should have also prepared for the reality of this moment — one that requires me to make an impossible decision. How am I supposed to find my way to supporting someone who will have the ability to stop the massacre of my people but refuses to publicly commit to doing so, and won’t even offer us a symbolic gesture? 

While the choices this cycle may seem so stark, many in my Arab and Muslim community are asking how I can vote for someone who cannot commit to ending the genocide of my people? To a grieving community where so many of them barely survived the first nightmare Donald Trump presidency, but who are also now watching as their families and loved ones are eliminated using our tax dollars and bombs, the choice feels impossible. 

I have agonized over this question every single day. Having this conversation right now feels like talking about politics at a funeral. The urgency and complexity is even more intense since early voting started in Georgia, a key swing state. So today, I once again find myself propelled by a grief so overwhelming it has made breathing, let alone making decisions, impossible some days. 

Voting this year carries a heavier weight, as it feels like choosing between survival and surrender. Please know this is not fear-mongering. It is a reality. Organizing around Palestine is difficult already with unprecedented efforts to silence and punish advocates. I don’t believe there’s anything worse than genocide. But the reality is a second Trump presidency would ensure continued disaster for our community and far too many other allied communities as well. 

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There is no handbook or instruction sheet we get for this moment. There is no established process that ensures the final decision will be the right one in the end. But there are allies, friends, family, supporters, and conscientious people that show up. Our beautiful multifaith, multiracial, multigenerational anti-war coalition saved my life the past year. The coalition that I am so grateful to be a part of kept me grounded. We stood together in solidarity, reminding the world that it was our collective impact that would bring about progress and desperately needed change, not any one of us individually. 

It is that coalition that I always think of when voting, and this moment cannot be an exception. While I will be voting for Vice President Harris, it must be said that this vote isn’t for her. It’s for the people in my district and state who cannot survive another Trump presidency. And yes, it’s for my community and our allies who refuse to sit by while our resources are used to commit a genocide in our names. 

Unlike President Joe Biden, Vice President Harris has a mixed record on the issue. She voted no on more weapons to Israel in 2019 and she consistently advocated to get aid into Gaza. I personally shared with her during a rally in Atlanta in July that our community is willing to give her a chance, but we need the bombs to stop and need her to enforce our laws. She agreed that the violence must end so that aid can get in, and we can de-escalate a rapidly expanding regional war. Is that enough? Of course not. The urgency of this moment requires moral clarity and real leadership. And that is what we must continue demanding. 

My vote is a promise — a promise that I and those who stand with me will not stop demanding the end of mass slaughter and violence everywhere. It’s a promise that, if Vice President Harris wins, we will work both for the people in my district and to use every avenue to demand she end this genocide and the decades-long, bigoted policies that have led to mass destruction, death, and displacement of Palestinians.

I tell people often, you don’t need to trust your elected officials. Show up and hold us accountable — remember we work for you. Vote for Vice President Harris not because she represents all of our ideals, but because there is a chance, even slim, that we can push her. But we can’t stop there: We must demand more, continue organizing and make it impossible for Vice President Harris — or anyone — to ignore our call demanding that she follow U.S. and international laws by ending the transfer of weapons being used to commit genocide. 

So to our incredible coalition, do not ever surrender. There will be a day after this election that demands we keep working. History is full of moments of the naysayers saying things will never change until we change them. This work continues regardless of the timeline of elections. Remember, Philip Randolph first proposed the March on Washington 20 years before it happened. History is riddled with examples of leaders maintaining their oppositional stances to our movements until they finally listened. 

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If we cannot imagine a better future, we’ll never be able to achieve it. It’s time to not only renew our commitment to our anti-war movement but also merge the efforts of those in the streets with those in the halls of power. Let’s plan for a mass demonstration in D.C. that ends with us meeting with our members of Congress to pressure them to shift our unjust policies and commit to not another bomb dropping on Palestinian, Lebanese, and Syrian loved ones. We can, and must, recommit our efforts to our anti-war movement in every lane from politics, to art, to mass mobilization.

And to Vice President Harris, there is so much promise in your historic candidacy and, hopefully, presidency. There is no reason for you to make this genocide any part of it. You enforced the law in the largest state in our country. You can do the same on the international stage and stop sending the weapons being used to kill innocent people, that are dragging us into a regional war, and that are breaking our own laws. Americans do not want another forever war. Listen to us.