WASHINGTON, Sept 19 (Askume) – Arab-American and Muslim voters angered by U.S. support for Israel’s assault on Gaza have abandoned Democrat Kamala Harris in the presidential race in favor of third-party candidate Jill Stein.This could prevent Harris from winning in key states that will decide the November 5 election.
Data released this month by the Council on American-Islamic Relations showed that 40% of Muslim voters in Michigan, home to a large Arab-American community, support the Green Party, according to a survey conducted in late August. Republican candidate Donald Trump received 18% of the vote, while President Joe Biden’s Vice President Harris trailed with 12%.
Stein also leads Harris among Muslims in Arizona and Wisconsin, two heavily Muslim battleground states where Biden beat Trump by slim margins in 2020.
The CAIR survey of 1,155 Muslim voters across the country showed that Muslim voters voted the most for Harris in Georgia and Pennsylvania, while Trump got 27% of the vote in Nevada, slightly more than Harris’ 26%. All these states are battleground states and recent elections have been won by very narrow margins.
Biden won the Muslim vote in 2020, with some exit polls showing his approval rating above 80%, but Muslim support for the Democratic Party has declined sharply since Israel’s nearly year-long crackdown in Gaza.
Nearly 3.5 million Americans are of Middle Eastern descent, according to the 2020 US Census, the first year such data has been recorded. Although they make up about 1% of the US population of 335 million, their voters could play a decisive role in a race that is very close according to surveys.
On Tuesday, Harris called for an end to the Israel-Gaza war and the return of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. She also said Israel should not reoccupy Palestinian territories and supported a two-state solution.
But community leaders said that in closed-door meetings in Michigan and elsewhere, Harris campaign officials have rejected calls to halt or limit U.S. weapons supplies to Israel.
“Decades of community organizing, civic engagement and mobilization have accomplished nothing,” said Faye Nemer, founder of the Michigan-based American Chamber of Commerce for the Middle East and North Africa, which promotes U.S. trade with the Middle East.
He said, “We are part of this country, but our concerns are not being paid heed to.”
Stein campaigned aggressively on Gaza, while Trump’s representatives were meeting with Muslim groups and promising to push for peace faster than Harris.
The Harris campaign declined to comment on the changing dynamics. Officials involved in Muslim outreach were not available for interviews.
Stein’s 2016 campaign ended with just over 1% of the popular vote, but some Democrats accused her and the Green Party of stealing votes from Democrat Hillary Clinton. Polls show Stein has no chance of winning in 2024.
But his support for a student movement demanding a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, an immediate US arms embargo on Israel and divestment of weapons investments by universities has made him a star in pro-Palestinian circles. His running mate is Butch Weir, a professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, who is Muslim.
This month, Stein spoke at the Arab Summit, an annual gathering of Arab Americans in Dearborn, Miss., and was featured on the cover of the Arab American News with the headline “The Choice for 2024.” Last week, she told the New York radio show “The Breakfast Club” that “every vote for our campaign is a vote against genocide,” a charge Israel denies.
Trump’s team is campaigning for Arab-American votes
Meanwhile, Trump’s former acting national intelligence director, Richard Grenell, said Trump’s team held dozens of in-person and virtual events with Arab Americans and Muslims in Michigan and Arizona.
Grenell said: “Arab-American leaders in Detroit know now is the time to send a strong message to the Democratic Party, and they should not take it lightly.” Trump said he would ensure there were more Arab–Israeli peace agreements.
Trump’s influence and Stein’s appeal could translate into figures who could pose a threat to Harris. With the exception of Georgia and Nevada, where the party is suing to be incorporated, the Green Party is on the ballot in most states, including all the battleground states that could decide the election.
In 2020, Biden beat Trump by just a few thousand votes in some states, thanks to support in states with concentrated Arab and Muslim voters, including Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
Biden won Michigan by 154,000 votes in 2020, but Trump beat Democrat Hillary Clinton by less than 11,000 votes in 2016. The state has more than 200,000 Muslim registered voters, as well as 300,000 voters from the Middle East and North Africa.
In Philadelphia, which has a large Black Muslim population, activists joined the national “Dump Harris” movement. They helped organize protests during last week’s debate with Trump.
“We have a choice. If Trump promises to end the war and bring back all the hostages, Harris’ game is over,” said Rabiul Chowdhury, CAIR’s co-president in Philadelphia. Trump once said the war would not have started if he were president. It’s not clear how he would end it. Trump is a staunch supporter of Israel.
In Georgia, where Biden won by 11,779 votes in 2020, activists are mobilizing 12,000 voters to refrain from voting for Harris unless the Biden administration stops all weapons shipments to Israel by October 10, agrees to a permanent ceasefire and the West Bank, and makes no commitment to comply with US laws that impose an arms embargo on countries guilty of war crimes.
Thousands of people in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin have signed similar pledges.
U.S. Rep. Dan Kildee, D-Mich., said he was concerned about the impact of November’s war in Gaza. It’s not just Arab Americans and Muslims, he said, but young voters and many others.
“You can’t turn the bells back,” he said, adding that Harris still has the “space and grace” to change course, but time is running out.
(Paragraph 2 of this article has been corrected to set the voting date to last month, not this month)
