Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel says she will skip her own party’s statewide nominating convention later this month because she does not feel safe attending. Her decision puts antisemitism, political harassment and the Michigan Democratic Party’s deepening Israel-Gaza divide at the center of the Aug. 29 gathering.
At a Lansing roundtable with Jewish parents, students, advocates and religious leaders, Nessel said the threats she receives are almost exclusively antisemitic and that she fears being chased, harassed, screamed at or booed off the stage, according to Deadline Detroit. She also said she has repeatedly raised concerns about party members who allegedly targeted her without seeing a meaningful response from party leadership.
The convention is scheduled for Aug. 29 at the Lansing Center, where Michigan Democrats will nominate candidates for attorney general, secretary of state, lieutenant governor and several university boards, according to the party’s official convention call. Nessel is term-limited and cannot seek another term, making the gathering one of the final major party events of her tenure.
Michigan Democratic Party spokesperson Derrick Honeyman said the party is committed to making its events safe and secure environments for all attendees, Deadline Detroit reported. He also said the party rejects antisemitism, Islamophobia and all forms of hateful conduct while preparing for the Lansing convention.
Michigan Democrats’ Israel Debate Has Already Boiled Over
The concerns come after a previous Michigan Democratic convention in Detroit produced its own antisemitism controversy. State Sen. Mallory McMorrow said a man shouted an antisemitic slur at her Jewish husband while he was walking with the couple’s 5-year-old daughter, according to WHMI.
Michigan Advance described that April convention as exposing a political fault line over Israel, with candidates facing boos, chants and sharply different views about the war in Gaza. McMorrow later dropped out of the U.S. Senate race, but the argument over antisemitism and criticism of Israel has continued to reshape the state party’s internal politics.
U-M Protest Cases Still Shadow Nessel
Nessel’s decision also lands in the middle of lingering anger over her office’s handling of pro-Palestinian protests at the University of Michigan. The Michigan Department of Attorney General charged 11 people after the May 2024 encampment’s removal, including seven people accused of trespassing and resisting or obstructing police, before dismissing those seven cases in May 2025.
In its dismissal announcement, the attorney general’s office said the cases had become a lightning rod of contention after months of court proceedings and repeated disputes over probable cause. Critics, including U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib and defense lawyers, had accused Nessel of bias, while Nessel maintained that her original charging decisions were based on the evidence.
Nessel Has Made Antisemitism A Signature Issue
The attorney general has publicly focused on antisemitism throughout the year, including after the March attack at Temple Israel in West Bloomfield. At a March press conference with Jewish elected officials, Nessel said antisemitism was becoming “far too comfortable” in Michigan and warned that the state needed stronger efforts to confront hate and domestic terrorism, according to the Michigan Department of Attorney General.
That makes her planned absence more than a scheduling choice: It is a public rebuke of a party she says has not adequately confronted antisemitism within its own ranks. For Michigan Democrats, the Aug. 29 convention will now carry an uncomfortable question into the Lansing Center — whether promises of security can persuade Jewish officials and voters that the party’s political home is still a safe one.
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