Heba Mohammad:
We are one of many buses that rode down from Wisconsin. Our bus had about 40 people on it. And it's a whole range of folks who are interested in this. There are Palestinians on the bus, of course, peace advocates who've been doing this work for decades now. Young folks, students, who are all coming together to send the same message to the nominees, to the Democratic Party, and, again, to the administration right now that we demand an arms embargo, we want an end to the genocide, and without that, they can't count on our votes, come November.

Steven Potter:
What are your plans for this week while you're here?

Heba Mohammad:
So I myself will be here just today. But I know a lot of people continue sticking around to reiterate our messaging and our demands. That's not gonna stop even after this week is over. We need them to follow through on our demands. It's for the best for Palestinians, for our country as well, right? As we're sending billions of dollars abroad to murder people, we're neglecting our communities at home. That money could be better spent here. So that's the message we will continue to reiterate throughout this convention and going forward until things changed.

...

I do think there is a chance that many voters will decline to vote at all. I know many, like I said before, are predicating their votes depending on what happens with the genocide. So folks who have voted Democratic before may not vote Democratic again. Many of the voters who voted uninstructed in April have indicated if the Democratic Party, if the administration follows through on our demands, they're willing to consider voting for the Democrats again. I'm not one of those people. As a Palestinian, as a Wisconsinite who has worked for the Democratic Party of Wisconsin, they've lost my vote entirely. We are at least 40,000 murdered Palestinians too late, billions of dollars too late to change my mind. But there are voters out there who are willing to reconsider voting for the Dems if they meet our demands and many more who will vote third party or not at all. And the ball is in the court of the Democrats to change people's minds by taking action immediately.

Steven Potter:
What would be a successful protest event for you in your mind? How do you walk away from this thinking, "we accomplished something"?

Heba Mohammad:
Yeah, I think, first of all, it's already been a success based on the turnout. People are saying, unequivocally, we care about what's happening in Palestine, and that needs to be a core part of the DNC's platform and what the Democrats do moving forward. So to me, it's already been a success to see all of these different people uniting around a shared cause. The demands here today also include, you know, funding schools, funding health care, taking care of our communities at home. And that's connected to Palestine because, as I mentioned, we're sending billions abroad to kill people instead of funding our communities at home. So I feel like we've already had a huge success in the turnout, the number of people uniting behind this message. But what I wanna see after today is people going home to their communities and continuing this work. The administration is in charge. They're being aided and abetted by Congress as well. ... And so we just wanna make sure that that message continues to be reiterated across the country, in our home communities, so that our elected officials know this will continue until the policy changes and action changes so the genocide ends.

Steven Potter:
Do you think that you'll be able to change any minds of some of the convention-goers?

Heba Mohammad:
I hope so. I'm counting on it frankly. I think a lot of people here, there are cease-fire delegates within the Democratic National Convention who are making cease-fire a priority in their asks as delegates. So we've been able to change those minds. This is not a complex issue or even one that people aren't supporting, right? So we know a majority of Democrats support a cease-fire, and almost an equal amount support in arms embargo in Israel. So this is not a controversial issue in that sense. We know the support is there. We just need people to continue taking action and to make clear as they're, you know, these party loyalists are within the DNC talking about nominating the presidential candidate, Kamala Harris. They can't leave that behind. They can't leave these demands behind if they really wanna see their candidate win.