Former U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke on Friday expressed support for a campaign in Michigan to vote “uncommitted” for President Biden in the state’s primary election, held on Tuesday February 27, over his handling of the Israel-Hamas war.
“I do think it makes sense for those who want to see this administration do more, or do a better job, to exert that political pressure and get the president’s attention and the attention of those on his campaign so that the United States does better,” O’Rourke said in a Friday interview with the Michigan Advance.
“I agree with the aims and the goals. We should have a ceasefire, there should be a return of each [and] every single one of those hostages [taken by Hamas], there should be an end to this war and there should be a negotiated solution to Palestinian statehood,” O’Rourke said. “All of that needs to happen, and I share the concern that the United States is not doing close to enough to bring those things to pass.”
O’Rourke, who ran for President in 2020 and later endorsed Biden, was visiting northern Michigan on Saturday, promoting his book, “We’ve Got to Try: How the Fight for Voting Rights Makes Everything Else Possible.”
O’Rourke recognizes that voters may become desensitized if every election is sold as the most important election of their lives, with action on key issues presented as being on the ballot even when their political party of choice already holds the levers of power.
“We sometimes think that everything literally hinges on just one election or just one person. If you do that again and again and again, it is absolutely exhausting, and if everything’s important, then nothing is,” O’Rourke said.
While O’Rourke voiced support for the uncommitted campaign in the Democratic primary, he said he would be open to campaigning for Biden in the general election, once his book tour ends. Short of that, O’Rourke said he will be working on voter registration in Texas “and doing our best within the environment of voter suppression and voter intimidation to help people get on the rolls, and then help those who are on the rolls to actually cast a ballot.”
“I support the president; I want him very badly to beat Donald Trump,” O’Rourke said. “I don’t want to do anything that weakens his ability to do that, because for whatever legitimate concerns people have about President Biden’s response to the war in Gaza, we do know for a fact that, under President Trump, it would be much worse. And so, yes, let’s help him, let’s push him, let’s apply pressure where we can, but let us in no way undermine his ability to win in November.”