New Jersey’s ‘uncommitted’ campaign will look different from Pennsylvania’s. Here’s how.

An effort to convince voters to abandon President Joe Biden in Democratic primaries as a protest against his administration’s policies supporting Israel will come to a close next month when New Jersey and other states hold the final presidential primaries of the cycle.

Progressive activists across the country have encouraged voters to vote “uncommitted” as a show of frustration with the Biden administration and in support of a cease-fire in Gaza.

The Uncommitted New Jersey campaign is hoping to reach 50,000 protest votes when the state holds its June 4 primary with the goal of compelling Biden to change his policies ahead of November.

“Our message has been loud and clear and you’ve moved but not enough and we’re going to try to get them to move as much as possible,” said Saif Hasan, a spokesperson for the Uncommitted New Jersey Campaign. “I hope that they move enough to where we feel like we live in a democracy again.”

The Biden administration informed Congress this week it would move forward with a sale of $1 billion in arms and ammunition to Israel, according to the Associated Press. It’s the first weapons shipment to move forward since Biden paused another weapons transfer of 3,500 bombs amid concerns of civilian casualties in the southern Gaza city of Rafah.

According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, nearly 35,000 people have been killed Gaza since Israel launched its military operation, following the Oct. 7 attack in which Hamas killed about 1,200 people and took around 250 hostages.

Hasan described the situation in Gaza as “hell on earth” that was being funded by American tax dollars.

Voters in most of New Jersey will have the option next month to vote for uncommitted delegates to this summer’s Democratic National Convention. The Uncommitted New Jersey Campaign, which is funded by the Democratic Socialists of America, launched a signature campaign to get those delegates on the ballot across the state.

The ballot language where the campaign was successful will be clear. In addition to the bolded word “uncommitted,” the ballot will include the slogan, “Justice for Palestine, Permanent Ceasefire Now.”

Voters in parts of Monmouth and Ocean Counties will not have that option.

Campaigners failed to reach the signature threshold needed to be included on the ballot in two of New Jersey’s 20 delegate districts. The campaign is asking protest voters in those two districts to write-in “uncommitted” on their ballot.

The New Jersey Department of State said candidates who filed nominating petitions as “uncommitted” will be on the ballot. Voters, a spokeswoman for the office said in an email, can pick from the delegates on the ballot, use a write-in option, or not vote.

There will not be a clear protest vote option for New Jersey Republicans who want to oppose former President Donald Trump, the party’s presumptive nominee.

No organization launched a signature campaign to have “uncommitted” or another protest option on the Republican ballot. Republicans who do not support Trump may use a write-in option or opt against tallying a vote in the presidential race.

Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley also won’t be on the ballot in New Jersey. Haley was on the ballot in Pennsylvania last month — despite dropping out of the race in March — and garnered 17% of the vote statewide, including 23% in Philadelphia’s collar counties.

Voters in Cherry Hill will have to write in Haley’s name if they want to support her over Trump.

Some states automatically have “uncommitted” as a listed option on presidential primary ballots, while advocates have had to fight for ballot access in other states or launched a write-in campaign.

In nine of the 18 states that had an “uncommitted” ballot option more than 10% of Democratic voters picked that option, according to data from the Associated Press. Often, at least 10% of the vote went to some combination of uncommitted, write-in votes, or minor challengers to Biden.

The results of the “uncommitted” campaign will be more clear in New Jersey than they were in Pennsylvania’s presidential primary last month.

Pennsylvania does not have an “uncommitted” option on the primary ballot so protest voters instead used the write-in option to vote uncommitted.

The state’s election code only requires counties to tally write-in votes that are cast for a person, meaning in many counties “uncommitted” votes for president were marked void or scattered. Not every county reported the total number of void or scattered votes registered.

More than 60,000 voters in the Democratic primary used the write-in option. In Philadelphia, data recorded by the City Election Commission showed that 14,625 of the write-in votes in that county were marked void — meaning they could have been “uncommitted” or they could have been for another nonperson entity, like Gritty. That number made up about 90% of the total write-in votes cast in the Democratic presidential primary.

Votes were also cast for a wide range of other individuals, including Trump, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders.