'Drop the Genocide 20': Activists Launch Campaign to Exclude Officials Behind Biden Gaza Policy From Democratic Politics

As another presidential election approaches and a new Democratic administration may be on the horizon, human rights campaigners are trying to ensure that it won't be staffed with the same policy officials who architected former President Joe Biden's Gaza policy.

Most Democratic voters are now appalled by Israel's military campaign in Gaza, which leading human rights groups and scholars have recognized as a genocide. It has led to the deaths of at least 73,000 Palestinians, including more than 21,000 children, according to official totals, and left most of the population displaced and living amongst rubble.

But many of the Biden advisers and appointees who gave cover to Israel during its pivotal, exceptionally deadly early months have settled comfortably back into the respectable liberal intelligentsia, with roles at universities, think tanks, and media outlets.

As 2028 inches closer, a coalition of peace groups is urging these institutions to pledge that they will "drop the Genocide 20," a group of 20 ex-Biden officials they deemed "responsible for promoting, lying about, and covering up the Gaza genocide," even as Israeli officials made numerous statements indicating intent to fully destroy Gaza and its people.

The list, published Thursday on the coalition's website, includes:

• Former Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who denied before Congress that Israel was blocking aid to Gaza despite his own State Department's assessment, a falsehood that allowed him to avoid following a US law that would have required the US to restrict weapons shipments to Israel. (Blinken is now a board member at the Center for American Progress.)
• Former National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, who said in May 2024 the administration categorically "does not believe" that Israel was committing a genocide. The International Court of Justice had already found a "plausible" genocide risk was present, while the United Nations special rapporteur for the Palestinian territories said there were "reasonable grounds” to believe a genocide was occurring. The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, meanwhile, had reported that Israel's "siege" cutting off humanitarian aid had left more than 1.1 million Palestinians facing "catastrophic" food insecurity and on the brink of famine. (Sullivan is now the Kissinger professor of the practice of statecraft and world order at Harvard's Kennedy School and a co-host of The Long Game, a national security podcast for Vox.)
• Former National Security Council Coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa Brett McGurk, who in November 2023 endorsed Israel's strangling of humanitarian relief as part of a method to secure the release of Israeli hostages held by Hamas and later denied a US Agency for International Development (USAID) report of starvation in Northern Gaza after Israel dismissed it. (McGurk is now a global affairs analyst at CNN and a partner at the New York-based venture capital firm Lux Capital.)
• Former Deputy National Security Advisor Jon Finer, who falsely claimed the US was putting "pressure" on Israel to reach a ceasefire and promoted Israel's false narrative that the Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza was a “command and control facility” for Hamas, helping to justify an attack that rendered the territory's largest medical facility "completely nonfunctional," according to the World Health Organization. (Finer is now a senior fellow with Yale Law School’s Tsai Leadership Program and co-hosts The Long Game with Sullivan.)
• Former White House National Security Communications Adviser John Kirby, who claimed that the Biden White House had "not seen any indication [Israeli forces] have violated international humanitarian law," in April 2024, at which point more than 33,000 Palestinians had been killed, and systemic attacks on civilian homes, medical aid workers, and schools had been widely documented.
• Former UN Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, who vetoed three ceasefire resolutions brought before the UN Security Council and denied that Israel was blocking aid.

"The purpose of the list is to demand these officials be removed from future Democratic administrations, as well as think tanks and academic and liberal spaces," said the coalition, which includes Just Foreign Policy; Palestinian Youth Movement; Track AIPAC, which tracks lobbying by pro-Israel donors; Peace Action; the Democratic Socialists of America; and About Face, a group representing anti-war veterans.

"The culture of bipartisan elite immunity is what drives US war crimes and support for war crimes. From the Vietnam War to post-9/11 torture to the Iraq War, elite war criminality never receives any meaningful sanction from either party. It is treated as a mere policy disagreement among friends," the coalition said. "This dynamic is a key reason Biden officials knew they could arm, defend, and cover up the genocide in Gaza for 15 months, and simply move back into liberal spaces, nonprofits, and future governments."

The campaign urged these organizations to oppose any efforts to give the 20 people on the list "institutional or political power that positions them to continue to perpetrate harm."

Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), the only Palestinian American lawmaker in the US House of Representatives, has signed the pledge, as has Pennsylvania state Rep. Chris Rabb, who is likely to enter the US House in January after winning the Democratic primary for Pennsylvania's 3rd Congressional District earlier this year.

Zeteo reporter Prem Thakker, who first broke news of the coalition's effort, said more lawmakers were expected to join in support.

The coalition noted that there were "far more than 20 people in the US government responsible for the US-backed genocide in Gaza" but acknowledged that it needed to limit itself to those most responsible to remain actionable.

It also said that a parallel effort was in the works to hold members of the Trump administration accountable for their own policies in Gaza and elsewhere.

"The Trump administration’s time will come, especially given its attack on Iran and war crimes against the Iranian people, the coalition said.

But for now, the activists are putting their focus on the Biden administration because “that’s who is currently out of power and actively engaging in reputation laundering and historical revisionism.”

The pledge comes as increasing numbers of Democratic politicians describe Israel's conduct in Gaza as constituting a genocide, a position shared by the majority of Democratic voters. The coalition said that without consequences, this is meaningless.

“The word ‘genocide’ has certain implications and obligations. It’s not a buzzword,” the coalition said. “If an elected [official] says Israel committed genocide, as 22 members of Congress have, then it logically follows they would agree to not hire, work with, or otherwise validate those most responsible for that which they themselves argue is a genocide. It’s common sense.”