Imraan Siddiqi, Washington state executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations and a Democratic candidate for the state House, praised antisemitic streamer Hasan Piker and demanded that the University of Washington reinstate Piker’s canceled lecture in an Aug. 13 letter that JNS obtained via a public records request.
Siddiqi criticized Robert Jones, president of the public university in Seattle, for appearing on a panel earlier this year, referring to a town hall in March about Jew-hatred at Seattle’s Bikur Cholim Machzikay Hadath, an Orthodox synagogue.
“It cannot be that the university finds space to platform and engage with voices who demean Muslims and pro-Palestinian speech, while abruptly canceling a Muslim community-supported speaker, whose central offense is criticizing a foreign government’s conduct in an ongoing war,” Siddiqi wrote.
In the letter, addressed to Jones and shared with the university’s board of regents, the Democratic candidate sought to reverse the university’s Aug. 7 cancellation of Piker’s lecture, which was scheduled for January 2027.
He praised Piker as “an unapologetic and consistent voice condemning Israel’s war crimes against Palestinians in Gaza” and accused the university of “capitulating to political pressure.”
“CAIR-WA respectfully requests that the University of Washington reverse the cancellation and reschedule Mr. Piker’s lecture as part of the 2026-27 speaker series,” he wrote.
CAIR was among the groups to blame Israel for being attacked on Oct. 7, and the Biden administration removed it from an advisory role on the national strategy on fighting Jew-hatred, after initially listing the group on the whole-of-government strategy.
JNS received the letter as part of a public records request one day after Siddiqi was a no-show at a candidate event at a Seattle synagogue. The Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle sponsored the event with StandWithUs Northwest, among others.
Siddiqi told organizers that he would come but never showed up. He was at a separate candidate forum, according to organizers, who told JNS that other candidates were able to make it to both events.
In a candidate questionnaire for the Jewish-sponsored event, Siddiqi wrote that, “I will continue to stand with the Jewish community whenever hate arises.”
He has received endorsements from Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) and Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), who are among Israel’s harshest critics in Congress.
Siddiqi’s opponent in the 32nd legislative district, Washington state representative Lauren Davis, who is also a Democrat, attended the Federation event.
Siddiqi’s campaign has raised $79,207—much less than the $230,224 that Davis has raised.
In the August primary, Davis received 75.3% of the vote. In Washington state, the two candidates that secure the most votes move on to the general election, irrespective of party.
Davis has received about three-quarters of the vote in the past few election cycles.
Siddiqi has faced criticism after CAIR’s Washington state branch sponsored an event in April at which attendees wrote letters to convicted terrorists. An event listing praised the “al-Aqsa flood,” a term that Hamas uses for the Oct. 7 attacks.
In June, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., U.S. secretary of health and human services, requested a State Department review of allegations that CAIR’s national organization and its Washington state and California affiliates had ties to terror.
In a letter JNS obtained through the public records request, Sigal Bujman Klein, director of campus affairs and external relations at the Hillel at University of Washington, wrote to the public school before the Piker event was canceled that “inviting him to campus inevitably conveys a degree of institutional endorsement.”
She warned that the invitation risked normalizing hostility toward Jews but did not ask the university to cancel the event.
JNS also received documents that included complaints from University of Washington professors, who accused Piker of Jew-hatred. Some donors threatened to withdraw financial support if the event took place.
After it was canceled, some wrote letters to the school accusing it of censorship and political favoritism, and some threatened to stop donating because the event was scrapped.
A Jewish alumnus of the university’s law school, who said that friends and relatives were murdered and raped on Oct. 7, thanked the University of Washington for canceling the event.
