An Interview with the Protester Who Disrupted Kamala Harris’s Closed Door UWM Meeting

The protester who confronted Vice President Kamala Harris at a closed-door University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee meeting says in an exclusive interview that he “laughed” when he received a text inviting him to the event because he has a long history of protesting the government. 

“I was laughing because I’ve been organizing things around the country for 15 years. I’ve had brush-ins with Homeland Security, FBI, and our organizations have been targeted over things like this in the past. So there’s like no way I got allowed into this,” he told Media Milwaukee in an interview.

The protester asked to stay anonymous in this interview because he is applying for law school and doesn’t want this story to be the first thing future educators look up.

When preparing for the event, he put on his kufiyah, which is a scarf that symbolizes Palestinian solidarity, liberation, and freedom according to CNN. Out of concern for getting kicked out, he. wrapped his kufiyah under his shirt and put on a button-up. He did not put his kufiyah on until the event began. 

“I really wasn’t planning on saying anything. I had to write my philosophy paper, and I had a bunch of things to do. I was nervous because I had national security next to me. But as she’s talking, she was talking to us as students and I was thinking that all universities in Palestine are gone. How could she come to talk to us about how she’s so excited for us as future entrepreneurs while her administration is actively sending billions of dollars that is killing students in Gaza, as if we aren’t the same. I couldn’t live with myself if I just listened.” Make this paragraph 3. 

After being escorted out of the meeting, he was brought to a police car where he was patted down, screened, and then put into the police car. After what he believes is 15 minutes he is issued a citation for disorderly conduct for $298.50 and released on site. He rejoined the protesters.   

Harris and “Shark Tank” star Mark Cuban came to UW-Milwaukee’s campus last Thursday to speak to business students about entrepreneurship. This meeting was impromptu impromptu with some students only receiving invitations around 7 p.m. the night before. News outlets were also not allowed in the meeting. As the meeting occurred, protests erupted outside of the Lubar Entrepreneurship Center. The protest was due to the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine. One student, who is a part of the UW4Pali Coalition was invited to the event.  

The protester disrupted Harris’s event, “What about the genocide, billions of dollars, 42,000 people are dead, 19,000 children are dead, and you won’t call it a genocide.” The video and article can be found here.  

The protester, 30, is a student here at UW Wisconsin-Milwaukee, he is a political science and pre-law major. He is a part of many different local and national communities, including the Muslim Student Association and Students for Justice in Palestine on campus, both members of UW For Palestine Coalition, and he is also a part of the Wisconsin Bail Out the People movement. He was involved in the encampment last May.  

“The very first time I was at a demonstration for Palestine was about when I was 17. I’ve been into politics since I was 15, and I’ve been involved in different organizations for about 15 years or so,” he told Media Milwaukee in the exclusive interview. 

When asked why he believes he got into the event, the protestor said, “I have a very Irish name and I just became a Muslim in March, so it’s not like my ties to well-known student orgs have been well documented.” He continued, “I know a handful of our other Palestinian brothers and sisters got the text and RSVP’D and every single one was denied.” 

At the event, James had to go through screening and security. He, among other students, were gathered in the hallway before being brought upstairs. There was a delay in Harris’s meeting since she was holding a press conference following the death of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar.  

Once in the room, he said that chants could be heard from the room and music was turned on in order to drown them out. He said students could be heard complaining about the protests saying stuff like, “A vote for anyone else is a vote for Trump.” 

When asked the question on what James thought about the statement, “A vote for anyone else is a vote for Trump,” this was his response. “I believe that there is absolutely no difference, genocide is genocide and they both support genocide. I would say democrats and republicans are political representatives of the same people.” 

While waiting for Harris, a moderator was asking questions to students prior to Harris’s entry. He asked if Harris was going to address the issue. 

Here is the video regarding that interaction. In the video, you can hear James say, “Is she going to address the ongoing genocide that she supports with 19,000 dead children already.” 

The moderator responds, “So this is an event to talk about small businesses, obviously the Vice President has talked in length about the work she is doing to try and bring that conflict to an end, she’s called for a ceasefire immediately and she will continue to do that. I came from the administration before I joined this campaign working on national security, so I know how many people are doing just that. I know the Vice President will continue to talk about that in the context of this conflict.” 

After further reiteration from the moderator that she will continue to talk about it, in the background you can hear a woman, what he said was the director of national security for the Harris campaign approach him, saying, “We have some folks here from our national security team that can talk to you a bit more in detail if you have some questions.” 

The protestor responded with “No.” From that point, he said that the Secret Service was standing behind and around him. 

Once the event began, Mark Cuban entered the room. The protestor said Cuban’s role was hyping the crowd up and preparing them for Harris’s entrance. Harris then entered the room and began her speech to the students. 

As of May 30, 2024, 80% of Gaza’s schools have been severely damaged or destroyed due to fighting, according to the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and all 12 universities have been destroyed. 

You can read more about the specifics of the video of James confronting Harris here. But, as the video cuts off, he says that’s when he was told that he was going to have to leave. He wanted to stay as long as possible but the Secret Service ended up getting him out of the room. 

“I even got the numbers wrong, and they didn’t call me out on it. It’s actually around 16,000 women and children and I said 19,000. That would’ve been the perfect thing to call me out on but they didn’t even know,” he told Media Milwaukee. 

According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health and AlJazeera News, as of October 23, 2024, 16,765 children have been killed in the conflict since October 7, 2023.  

When James left the room, he was escorted down the stairs by two UWM police officers, and he was handcuffed, patted down, and escorted outside. There is a video taken from the Kenwood/KIRK building of the protestor being escorted away, the video can be hard to tell, but he confirms that it is him.  

According to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, “In a statement to Israeli media, Harris’ campaign said Harris was not confirming a genocide was taking place. ‘She made a general statement about the need to end the war, and expressed sympathy for the genuine feelings that the issue evokes in many people,’ the campaign said. ‘However, she didn’t agree with defining the war as a genocide, and she has not expressed such a stance in the past, as this is not her position.’”