Our 8th District representative, Kim Schrier, has one of the worst voting records in the country for a Democrat in Congress with regards to Palestine. Here in Washington state, she is beaten only by Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (who is, by the way, one of four Democrat votes for the GOP voter suppression bill, the SAVE Act) in terms of Democrat members of Congress who are worse.
Check out voteoutkimschrier.com for specific examples of just some of the bad bills that Schrier has voted for. For her voting record on Palestine specifically, see the Congressional Democrat Palestine Tracker.
Wenatchee for Palestine spent the first half of 2024 attempting to pressure Schrier into voting better.
Many of us are Democrat voters who helped elect her in the first place. It was not easy or fun to turn against our own party’s congresswoman, but it became clear very early on that Schrier was an active threat to the lives of Palestinians, and we felt that as Wenatchee voters, we had a better chance of influencing her than we did of influencing our senators, Patty Murry and Marie Cantwell, or President Biden.
We tried multiple tactics.
By May 2024, we’d had enough. We had protested outside of her office, and had called and emailed her office(s) many times, for multiple issues, all to no avail.
Protest at the Stemilt Grand Parade on May 4, 2024
So we decided to bring the protest directly to Representative Schrier herself. We saw her listed on the lineup for the Stemilt Grand Parade (she was number 71), so we planned a protest at the actual parade.
We brought signs and flags and claimed a spot in the crowd before the parade begun, then stayed there for the duration of the parade. The only time we were actually disruptive and made noise was when Schrier herself walked past.
To our surprise, we received a lot of positive reactions from people in the parade procession, and got very little negative attention. Even in Wenatchee, there is a lot of support for Palestine.
When Kim Schrier reached us, she tried her best to ignore us and refused to even look at us, but we made sure she heard us by chanting loudly. Some nearby people also joined in on our chants! Here’s a video from our protest. We made our presence known to her loud and clear.
After the parade protest, Ruby, who worked at Schrier’s Wenatchee District Office, reached out to us and wanted to meet with us. So two of us met with her in person and had a conversation that lasted well over an hour.
We expressed an interest with meeting with Schrier directly, but that offer never manifested.
Chelan Pride and Wenatchee Pride in June 2024
A month later, we tabled at Chelan Pride and Wenatchee Pride and collected signatures for a statement that we had written to Kim Schrier expressing four demands:
- For a total and permanent ceasefire
- For humanitarian aid to be allowed to enter Gaza, including reinstating funding to UNRWA
- For the United States to stop arming and funding the Israeli military
- For an end to apartheid in Israel
We collected 58 signatures at Chelan Pride on June 8, and 308 signatures at Wenatchee Pride on June 22. Once again, we received almost entirely positive attention from Pride attendees.
We delivered the 366 signatures in person to Kim Schrier’s Wenatchee District Office.
Challenging Kim Schrier in the August 6, 2024 primary
Kim Schrier did have an anti-genocide challenger in the primary, a longtime civil rights leader and director of Washington’s chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Imraan Siddiqi.
Siddiqi was actually endorsed by The Stranger for that election, though they didn’t think he had any chance of winning due to Schrier’s fundraising advantage and incumbent status. We tried our best to promote Siddiqi’s campaign as much as we could with our limited means.
Sadly, the stark difference in campaign funds proved to be too much of an obstacle to overcome, and Schrier defeated Siddiqi pretty soundly.
The fight continues
Kim Schrier is a difficult adversary. She is very entrenched in her current position, and even with employing multiple pressure tactics, nothing we have tried so far has been enough to get her to noticeably budge on anything.
We’re not giving up, though.
Despite the horrific atmosphere of a second Trump presidency, a new wind is blowing in the political landscape of America.
A recent Pew Research Center poll found that a majority (53%) of Americans now hold unfavorable opinions of Israel. Among Democrats, it’s nearly 70%. And even among young Republicans (age 18-49), fully 50% now hold unfavorable opinions of Israel!
An IMEU Policy Project poll published in January found that nearly 30% of Biden 2020 voters who did not vote for Kamala Harris in 2024 indicated that ending Israel’s violence in Gaza was the most important motivation for their vote.
Kim Schrier is from an era of the Democratic party that is ending. The will of the people is shifting, and she can either shift with it or lose the rest of her backing.
Just as the Democratic party was forced to decide in the 60’s if it was going to support civil rights or lose its Black voters, the modern Democratic party must decide if it is going to be the party of genocide and lose all relevance, or if it’s going to change course and chart a path to an actual better future instead of a “less bad” one.
We can help them get there by staying true to our values and refusing to accept candidates who are pro-genocide, pro-ICE, and pro-police. Kim Schrier can either adapt or leave politics and make room for someone better.
Things that you can do to help:
- Ruby, who works at Kim Schrier’s Wenatchee District Office, told us that she receives a lot of calls from a small number of people, so if you’ve never called them before to speak about Schrier’s voting record on Palestine, do so now: (509) 850-5340.
- Tell your friends and family about Schrier’s abysmal voting record! The more her constituents get angry at her for it, the more likely she will be pressured into giving us at least some concessions.
- Disrupt Kim Schrier at her public appearances whenever possible! The only time we achieved any sort of concessions was after we disrupted her.
