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Ray
LaHood
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By
Dina Rashed, IOL Correspondent
CHICAGO,
November 5 (IslamOnline) - As American voters cast their ballots for the
U.S. midterm elections, Arab and Muslim organizations are hoping that
the community members actively participate in the voting process and act
as a unified bloc to get their voices heard in Congress and in local
municipalities.
In
the Tuesday election all 435 seats in the House of Representatives, 34
of 100 Senate seats and 36 state governorships are at stake deciding who
controls Congress.
According
to the data presented by the Arab American Institute, there are 39
Muslim and Christian Arab Americans running for a wide range of public
offices including state governors, U.S. representatives and senators,
and state representatives and senators.
Some
of the candidates are held in Key races like the Governor office in the
state of New Hampshire where the two candidates with Arab American ties
are squaring off the race; John Sununu and Jeanne Shaheen.
In
West Virginia Nick J. Rahall II (D-3), who is also Dean of the Arab
American congressional delegation, in Illinois Ray LaHood (R-18), in
Louisiana Chris John (D-7), and in California Darrell Issa (R-49) are
all Arab Americans running as incumbents and seeking reelection in the
U.S. House of Representatives.
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Nick
Rahall
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United
Muslim American Association, an organization devoted to stimulating the
political activism of the Muslims and the Arab Christians in Illinois,
has been vigorously seeking community involvement by holding
candidates’ forums and election nights through out the suburbs of
Chicago, where close to a half a million Muslim and Arab reside.
In
the final days prior to the election, UMAA released its list of endorsed
candidates from the Governor to the local representatives. The major
criteria for such endorsement, is how open the candidates are to
concerns of the Muslim community and its voters.
Despite
the efforts of various Arab American and Muslim organizations calling
upon the community to strike a balance between their international
interests and their local interests as American citizens by weighing in
the candidates based on their positions from local issues such as
housing, education and health care, the Middle East conflict, the War on
Iraq and the war on terrorism as much as racial profiling, remain to be
the major issues of concerns and determinant to how their votes are
swinging.
According
to a recent poll conducted by Zogby International, 40% of the Arab
American votes in the 2002 elections are supporting the Democratic Party
while 30% support the Republicans.
The
results represent a shift in the votes towards the Democrats when
compared to the previous election of 2000, where previous poll showed
then that 44% of the Arab Americans supported the Republicans and 43%
supported the Democrats. In that same election year, where major Muslim
and Arab organization openly endorsed Bush for President, 45.5%
supported him, while 38% were in support of Al Gore ( Ralph Nader, who
is of an Arab descent received 13% of Arabs and Muslims’ votes).
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Darrell
Issa
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The
performance of the Bush administration on international issues,
specially with regard to resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the
unexplained quest to attack Iraq and the attack on civil rights of the
Muslims and Arabs are all contributing to the increasing level of
skepticism towards whether or not the Republican candidates can
represent the Muslim community’s interests.
In
Illinois the Palestinian-Israeli conflict played a role in the election
campaigns, as some the candidates refused the UMAA’s endorsement for
fear of pushing away the Pro- Israeli voters.
Joe
Birkett, a Republican who is running for the office of Illinois Attorney
General, and endorsed by UMAA, returned contributions given to his
campaign by Robin Zahran, an active community member, because Zahran
publicly stated that his support to Birkett was in part a stand against
the other candidate running for the office, and who supported what is
called the “Israeli Bonds Bill”, a legislation in the Illinois State
Senate allowing state investment in Israeli Bonds.
As
a result Birkett refused to accept the donations and the contribution
was returned to Zahran. Birkett then explained that Zahran’s remarks
placed him in an awkward position with other constituents.
The
Zogby poll, released by the AAI, also shows that 49% of the Arab
Americans surveyed rated the Middle East conflict as a “very
important” topic in the elections, while 29% said “somewhat
important”.
President
Bush has attended some 65 fund-raisers this year, helped bring in more
than $140 million for Republican candidates and the party as a whole,
but his favorable ratings are in decline within the Arab and Muslim
communities. The poll results revealed a decline in the satisfaction
towards his handling of their concerns to a 46% compared to a 54% last
May and a 90% satisfaction in October 2001
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