I faced a primary dilemma - Biden or ‘no preference.’ My vote was a protest. | Opinion

On a Friday in February, before the Michigan primaries, I voted early in the North Carolina Democratic primary — as a first-time voter. Though I moved to the United States in 2009 as a college student, I only became a citizen last year. Never having politically belonged in this country before, I walked into the polls as a 33-year-old woman voting in any election for the first time in my life.

The first choice given to me: Joe Biden or “no preference” for president. No other options were given, and no write-ins permitted.

I faced a dilemma: I did have a preference, I preferred not to support a candidate who used my tax dollars to fund wars abroad. As a Nepali scholar of globalization, foreign policy is a key priority for me. After months of helplessly witnessing children in Gaza starving and dying across my social media feeds, I found myself in that one moment holding the tiniest unit of power.

I abstained from voting in the presidential race and focused down-ballot.

A few weeks later on March 5, the “no preference” option in North Carolina emerged as a symbol of collective action demanding a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. North Carolina’s vote came on the heels of the unexpected success of the “uncommitted” campaign in Michigan. In North Carolina’s Democratic primary, 88,021 voters chose the “no preference” option over Biden.

Some early voters like me, who went to the polls before Michigan’s focused protest campaign, may have abstained from voting for president in the Democratic primary instead of choosing “no preference.” That means the actual number of protest voters in North Carolina may be even higher.

The “no preference” campaigns in Michigan and North Carolina were mounted by Arab and Muslim communities dissatisfied with the Biden administration’s handling of the war in Gaza. A parallel protest campaign in Minnesota lead to “uncommitted” gaining an 18.9% share of the votes in that traditionally “blue” state.

Voters across North Carolina have become a part of a historic movement to put pressure on the Biden administration to call for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. In addition to calling for a ceasefire, these voters want Biden to immediately stop funding Benjamin Netanyahu’s government and redirect all U.S. efforts to providing humanitarian aid in Gaza.

In 2020, Donald Trump won North Carolina by 74,483 votes, substantially fewer that than the 88,021 who voted “no preference” in the N.C. Democratic primary.

As a key battleground state, North Carolina voting patterns have the power to sway the general elections in November. The 2024 statewide “no-preference” votes surpass the “no-preference” voting numbers from the 2020 and 2016 Democratic primaries.

These protest votes indicate a challenging general election ahead for Biden unless he pays attention to the segment of his base demanding peace and humanitarian aid in Gaza. While Vice President Kamala Harris called for a six-week ceasefire days after the Michigan campaign, the N.C. and Minnesota results demonstrate that protest voters in the Democratic Party will not be satisfied with temporary pauses. These voters are aware of their power to sway the general election and they’re using this power to hold Biden accountable. They continue to put pressure on the administration to make Middle East peace an immediate and permanent foreign policy priority.

How Biden responds to these pressures will determine the outcome in November 2024.

Dr. Aarushi Bhandari is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Davidson College, where she teaches courses on statistics, globalization, social media, global change and more.