Huwaida Arraf, a Palestinian American activist, filed a lawsuit against the Michigan Democratic Party on Thursday, alleging she may have been cheated in her quest for the Democratic nomination for a seat on the University of Michigan Board of Regents.
Arraf claims the party’s process of selecting two nominees for the board on Aug. 24 was marred by voting irregularities, discrepancies, and a lack of transparency.
“We cannot be confident in the results that have been announced,” Arraf said at a news conference Thursday. “It’s an affront to the electoral integrity, which we should take seriously.”
According to the official results, Arraf was defeated by incumbent Democrat Denise Ilitch and former regent Dr. Shauna Ryder Diggs, who left the board in 2020. Diggs garnered more than 2,800 votes, while Ilitch received over 2,400 votes, according to the official tally. Arraf, founder of the International Solidarity Movement and an international civil rights lawyer who represented students in civil rights cases demanding the university’s divestment from Israel, received more than 2,300 votes.
At the convention, there were 1,248 voters present, Arraf said, but more than 1,420 voters were identified in the final tally. She also believes Democrats were allowed to vote after the 4:39 p.m. deadline to cast a ballot.
According to the party’s rules, the votes were proportionally weighted by county using a formula based on Democratic turnout in the most recent even-year election. This weighting system is intended to ensure that the final results accurately reflect the preferences of Democratic voters across the state’s counties. The system leads to drastic differences in the value of each person’s votes.
In the popular vote, before the ballots were weighted, Arraf said she defeated Diggs by about 120 votes and Illitch by about 210 votes.
Arraf said her problem isn’t with the weighted system, but with how the votes were counted.
According to her account, Arraf said there was missing data, and to address the issue, the party counted raw data in a tabulation area, where she and her staff were forbidden to enter. Meanwhile, other candidates, their families, and current regents were allowed in the tabulation area.
When the votes were announced, Arraf had lost. She said she repeatedly asked party leaders for the raw data, but they declined to turn it over.
The data she did receive showed discrepancies, she said.
“That is greatly distburning because you have a situation where the leadership of the Michigan Democratic Party was put on notice that there were problems with the validity of the data they have given us, not even the raw data, and they should want to clarify this so we can be confident of the results, and I received no response to that,” Arraf said.
Arraf’s lawsuit was filed in the Ingham County Circuit Court.
Arraf said the process was demoralizing and comes at a time when Michigan Democrats should be inclusive and welcoming. She noted that she was accompanied by hundreds of new participants who supported her.
“If you don’t feel like your voice and participation will count, then there is no incentive to get involved,” Arraf said. “And that is not what we want, especially in the time that we are now, leading up to the November election, knowing how much of a threat a potential [Donald] Trump presidency can be, and that is why we are further dismayed at how the Michigan Democratic Party has seemingly not cared about the fact that they have disenfranchised and disillusioned the hundreds of new members that came to participate in the convention,” Arraf said.
The Michigan Democratic Party did not respond to requests for comment.
