Lansing — A former Michigan Democratic Party chairman asked current party leadership on Monday to review the conduct of five Democrats accused of orchestrating threats against University of Michigan officials over the school’s ties to Israel.
The five Democratic Party members were among a group of eight individuals indicted last week in Michigan and accused, by federal prosecutors, of damaging properties with spray-painted messages and throwing glass jars filled with noxious chemicals at a home.
Lon Johnson, who was the party’s chairman from 2013 to 2015, asked the party’s current chairman, Curtis Hertel Jr., to review the allegations against the five members and to determine whether further action, including suspension or expulsion, from the party is warranted.
“This request is not intended to prejudge the outcome of the criminal case but rather to ensure that the party’s stated commitment to opposing harassment, intimidation and discriminatory conduct is applied consistently,” Johnson said in an email to Hertel.
The party’s code of conduct prohibits “any form of discrimination, bullying or harassment.” The punishments can include censure, suspension or removal from the organization, the code says.
In an interview, Johnson said the allegations in the federal indictment were consistent with behavior he saw at the party’s April 19 convention. Johnson declined to go into specifics about what he encountered at the convention in Detroit.
“There’s no place in politics for violence or intimidation,” Johnson said. “Democracy depends on the peaceful exchange of ideas.”
Supporters of the eight defendants have labeled the federal government’s charges dubious and an effort to criminalize student opposition to the human rights violations in Gaza.
Yet, the group’s alleged actions featured stalking targets — including former UM President Santa Ono and Regent Jordan Acker, who is Jewish and a prominent Michigan Democrat — and discussing ways to harm them and their relatives, federal prosecutors have said.
Some members of the group are “ardent supporters” of Hamas, which the Justice Department has designated a foreign terrorist organization, according to federal prosecutors.
Investigators have said three of the individuals targeted Acker’s home in the middle of the night, throwing two clear mason jars containing Butyric acid at his window.
On one university official’s garage door, some members of the group left a note that said, according to prosecutors, “How dare you live in peace with your children when the very bombs you invest in have destroyed so many families? … Blood is seeping from every seam, every crack of your house.”
In a chat from May 2024, two of the defendants allegedly exchanged messages and agreed to “kill,” “torment” and “terrorize” unidentified targets, including the university president at the time — who was Ono and who is listed in the indictment as “Victim 4,” or V-4.
“We are finding (V-4’s) address if we don’t have it already (so I can) drive my car into it,” Ahmet Korkaya, 28, of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, wrote. “(V-4’s) entire family is now on my hit list.”
“Lets get (V-4’s) kids bruh …,” Paige Feyock, 26, of Ann Arbor wrote.
The indictment charged some members of the group with conspiracy to transmit threats in interstate and foreign commerce. That crime is punishable by up to five years in federal prison.
Acker was a candidate for reelection as a regent at the Michigan Democratic Party convention on April 19. However, convention voters there decided not to renominate him.
Three of the defendants charged in the federal indictment — Feyock, Amatullah Hakim, 21, of Ann Arbor and Jonathan Zou, 22, of Ann Arbor — voted at the convention, according to internal party records previously obtained by The Detroit News.
All three voted for Amir Makled, a lawyer who represented University of Michigan student protesters, to be a Democratic Party nominee for regent over Acker, according to the records.
Johnson’s letter to Hertel said Zainab Hakim, 23, of Canton Township and Mariam Odeh, 24, of Dearborn, a former paid employee of Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed’s campaign, are also party members.
In a statement, Hertel said party leaders were “appalled by the details of this indictment and the hateful, antisemitic threats that took place.”
“The Michigan Democratic Party condemns all acts of hatred and violence, which have no place in Michigan and should not be tolerated,” Hertel said.
Jim Runestad, chairman of the Michigan Republican Party, said he hoped Hertel would take the matter seriously and condemn the actions of his party members.
“It’s disappointing, yet not surprising, to learn that Democrat Party members were among those charged with criminal conduct for threatening and harassing public officials and their families,” Runestad said Tuesday.
Asked on Friday if the indicted individuals should lose their party membership, El-Sayed said the justice system needed to take its course.
“Nobody’s been convicted of anything,” El-Sayed said. “I just want to be clear.”
El-Sayed said part of him believes people “don’t lose your political rights because you might have done something illegal.”
cmauger@detroitnews.com
Staff Writer Robert Snell contributed.
This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: 5 UM threat case suspects were Democratic Party members, ex-chair says
Reporting by Craig Mauger, The Detroit News / The Detroit News
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By Craig Mauger, The Detroit News | USA TODAY Network
