Protests and Chaos at the Democratic National Convention: Leadership of the Anti-DNC Protests

Over 150 Extremist Groups Supporting Protests and Chaos at the Democratic National Convention (full series)
Findings | Leadership of the Anti-DNC Protests
Plots to Disrupt the DNC Convention
Appendix

Leadership of the Anti-DNC Protests

Around 30,000 protestors are expected to take part in the anti-DNC protests. Four Chicago-based Islamic organizations have gone so far as to predict an attendance of over 100,000.

Leaders, members, and official supporters of the Coalition to March on the DNC have long vowed to protest illegally if they are denied a permit near the convention or are granted an overly restrictive permit.

After a six-month delay, the city of Chicago finally approved a very limited permit that denies the coalition the ability to set up and use basic necessities required for any significant demonstration, such as tents, bathrooms, and sound and lighting equipment.

Many of the groups involved in the anti-DNC demonstrations have expressed support for and even provided guidance on how to engage in violence and destruction that arguably qualifies as terrorism, such as resisting police crackdowns and “de-arresting” those who are apprehended by law enforcement by physically battling the police to free them and then quickly escaping.

The city’s officials are apparently aware of many of the groups’ public plotting and ideological extremism, arguing that the bans on basic necessities are necessary because weapons can be hidden in or created using those prohibited items.

The Coalition to March on the DNC rejects the notion that the protests could become violent and oddly speaks with total confidence that it can control the behavior of the 30,000 to 100,000 expected demonstrators. It claims that it is so well-prepared to maintain safety at the protests that they don’t even need police assistance, guaranteeing it will be “family friendly.”

The Coalition to March on the DNC and the previous Coalition to March on the RNC appear to be spearheaded by a partnership between two pro-Hamas organizations: the US Palestinian Community Network (USPCN) led by Hatem Abudayyeh and the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression (NAARPR), which identifies USCPN as an “affiliate organization.”

USPCN. Hatem Abudayyeh, the national chairman of USPCN, has been the most consistent spokesperson for both March coalitions since the beginning, giving the strong impression that he is the ringleader of the overall network that has put together both coalitions. He said his goal is to make Democratic Party officials feel “miserable.”

Nazek Sankari, an official co-chair of the Coalition to March on the DNC, is also the co-chair of USPCN’s Chicago chapter. She celebrated International Women’s Day in March by praising female Palestinians who have violently fought Israel and framed their cause as “inherently a reproductive justice and feminist issue.”

“Palestinian women have ensured that the legacy of resistance lives on generation after generation. They have always been leading the popular resistance, and their teachings and legacy have been enshrined in armed resistance as well,” she said.

USPCN is reportedly the largest group in the Coalition to March on the DNC, at least as of early May. The coalition acknowledged Abudayyeh and USPCN’s elevated role in a video on its Instagram page featuring Abudayyeh alongside text describing USPCN as a “leading” member of the coalition.

Interestingly, the organizers of the Coalition to March on the RNC in Milwaukee in July apparently did not want USPCN’s deep involvement to be obvious. The website did not list USPCN as a coalition member, but USPCN boasted about its presence at the protest on its social media pages once it was underway.

Abudayyeh’s speech at the March on the RNC expressed support for Middle Eastern terrorist groups who he enthusiastically proclaimed will soon destroy Israel and defeat “the U.S. empire,” which he confidently asserted to be “on its last legs.”

Abudayyeh is also the executive director of the Chicago-based Arab American Action Network (AAAN), another member of the Coalition to March on the DNC.

He attacked the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) for expressing reasonable concerns that some pro-terrorism protestors might act like the terrorists they admire. He said ADL is “racist” against blacks, Arabs, and Muslims and that it seeks the “criminalization of our community” via the “weaponization of anti-Semitism.”

His resume shows that he is also an Advisory Board member of the National Network for Arab American Communities, which is an “institution” of the Arab American Community Center for Economic and Social Services (ACCESS). His bio also points out that AAAN is a member of the National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights and Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights.

Abudayyeh, who has a well-documented history of supporting terrorism, was one of at least 23 activists in Chicago and Minneapolis whose homes were raided or who were issued subpoenas as part of a FBI counterterrorism investigation in 2010.

The authorities believed they had strong evidence that the suspects had provided material support to terrorist organizations, particularly PFLP and the Marxist-Leninist narco-terrorist group Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), which appeared on the State Department’s list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations until November 2021.

Other reports indicated that law enforcement was also investigating links to Hamas and Hezbollah. One of the suspects said it seemed that the FBI’s case related to their links to the Palestinian Women’s Committees, a front for PFLP.

In addition to USPCN and AAAN, suspects also belonged to two other members of both March coalitions: the Marxist-oriented and pro-Hamas Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO) and the Minnesota Anti-War Committee (also known simply as the Anti-War Committee) that proclaims solidarity with the government of Iran, Hamas, the Syrian dictatorship of Bashar Assad, and other Iran-backed terrorists. This “anti-war” group even endorsed Iran’s direct attack on Israel in April 2024.

Suspects were also linked to the FightBack! news media outlet, an FRSO entity. Abudayyeh appeared on a FightBack! podcast three weeks after the attacks on October 7, 2023, to glorify the attacks.

AAAN had a convicted PFLP terrorist, Rasmea Odeh, serving as its associate director until she was imprisoned in 2015 and deported back to Jordan in 2017 for lying about her involvement in terrorism on her application for citizenship. She is also the co-founder of AAAN’s Arab Women’s Committee.

An Instagram post from September 2022 authored by USCPN and reposted by Mamas Activating Movements for Abolition and Solidarity (MAMAS) says Odeh is a “co-founder” of USPCN. Elsewhere, USCPN has only described her role in the group as that of founding member of its Chicago chapter.

NAARPR. NAARPR endorsed the Hamas-led terrorist attacks on Israel on October 7. It said, “the Unified Palestinian Resistance initiated a morally and legally justified self-defense campaign on October 7th, 2023.”

NAARPR even threatens to become violent itself. It says it “pledges to (politically and physically, if necessary) defend the democratic rights of all Palestinians and supporters who are coming under government, Zionist, and law enforcement attack in the U.S. and everywhere else.”

Kobi Guillory, co-chair of the Coalition to March on the DNC, is simultaneously co-chair of the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, a chapter of NAARPR. A spokesperson for the DNC March, Faayani Aboma Mijana, is also a member of NAARPR’s Chicago wing.

Guillory was permitted to enter Syria in 2021 as part of a trip to see the presidential “elections” take place. It was arranged by a group called the Syria Solidarity Movement that staunchly backs the Iran-aligned Syrian dictatorship that sponsors Hamas, Hezbollah, and various other terrorist organizations. He represented FRSO and the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression in the delegation to Syria.

He conducted a joint interview with Wyatt Miller of the Minnesota Anti-War Committee after returning home. What the dictatorship showed them unsurprisingly vindicated the Assad regime to the fullest degree and accused the U.S., the entirety of the Syrian rebels and opposition forces and the regional partners of the U.S. to the fullest degree.

The pair claimed that Assad is an overwhelmingly popular freedom fighter trying to save his country from U.S. “imperialism.” Guillory alleged that characterizations of Assad as a dictator are based on false agenda-driven propaganda. Miller even defended Syrian elections as legitimate and credible, asserting that “Syria is a republic, where people vote for their president in democratic elections, as defined in their constitution.”

The delegation also included the pro-Assad groups Arab Americans for Syria and the International Action Center, the latter of which defends Hamas’s October 7 atrocities, publicly aligns with the government of Iran and its terrorist proxy groups and publishes propaganda and calls-to-action from Hamas, PFLP, the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine—General Command.

The lead organizer and co-chair of the March on the RNC was Omar Flores. He is also the finance chair of NAARPR’s Milwaukee chapter, which is also involved in the upcoming DNC protests.

Jasmine Smith, the co-chair of NAARPR’s Chicago chapter’s Campaign to Free Incarcerated Survivors of Torture, seemed to allude to advancing the group’s cause through violent revolution when she chose to honor Assata Shakur on International Women’s Day in March.

Shakur was a fiercely anti-American Marxist militant who could arguably be described as a terrorist. She was a supporter of the Black Panthers and was convicted of murdering a police officer. She then fled to Cuba and received safe harbor from its communist government for the rest of her life.

She said, “Like Assata Shakur said, it is our duty to fight for our freedom, and it is our duty to win. All of us who are oppressed have a common enemy, which is this parasitic system, so we need to come together and fight until we win!”

In the next installment, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) is strongly linked to an effort to disrupt or shut down the DNC convention.