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Books of ballot slips for the Democratic and Republican parties lie on a table at a polling station in East Los Angeles, Feb. 5, 2008. (Reuters Photo) |
One can hardly walk into a masjid in America these days without seeing information on how to register to vote or meeting someone eager to help you to register. Perhaps it is due to the sense of disfranchisement many Muslims in America have felt over the last seven years or maybe it is due to the fact that American Muslims are a maturing community and along with numerical growth and age comes political sophistication.
"It is time for Muslims to step up to the plate in 2008 and take their souls to the polls," Imam Mahdi Bray, the Executive Director of the Muslim American Society Freedom Foundation (MAS), has said repeatedly throughout the year.
Towards that effort, the "MAS Voting is Power" program has launched Muslim voter registration drives all throughout the nation putting thousands of new Muslims on the rolls in swing-states such as Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, and Michigan. MAS VIP is joined in this effort by an assortment of Muslim organizations all pledged to bring out a record Muslim voter turnout in 2008. This effort hoped to build upon the 2004 Muslim vote (which exit polls show going solidly for the Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry) and the famous 2000 bloc-vote which many Muslims feel tipped the scales towards George W. Bush.
More Active than Ever
| 70 percent of the eight million Muslim Americans are expected to actively vote in this election. |
At a town hall forum earlier this year for Muslim voters in Philadelphia, Imam Bray stated "this is not going to be like 2000 … a handful of Muslims on top are not going to select and give an endorsement in the name of the entire Muslim community … we are looking for an endorsement from the grassroots." Already, out of the eight million Muslim in the US, 86 percent are registered to vote while 70 percent are expected to actively vote according to Executive Director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), Nihad Awad.
A popular consensus has arisen in the Muslim community that a majority of American Muslims support the candidacy of the Democratic Senator Barack Obama. Obama bumper stickers can be seen at masjid parking lots across the country with a high level of frequency along with a high level of enthusiasm for his candidacy in a number of Muslim Student Association chapters and countless Muslim volunteers for his campaign. However, Muslim support in this election is not one-sided, as there is sure to be a significant percentage of American Muslims supporting the candidacy of the Republican Sen. John McCain.
Omair Ahmed of Chicago has warm feelings towards McCain. "I have high regard and respect for John McCain. He is a straight talker. He has made personal sacrifices for this nation (as a veteran and then as a POW). This level of service and sacrifice is unparalleled."
Responding to charges that the GOP, considering that it is full of Islamophobes and conservative talk-radio and blogs — such as Free Republic — is rife with anti-Muslim rhetoric, Ahmed says "Both parties have animosity against Muslims. In this matter, I prefer the honesty of the GOP to the deceit and hypocrisy of the Democrats. In case people have forgotten, Obama is on record for being in favor of invading Pakistan in pursuit of terrorists."
Voting for Moral Values
| "John McCain is a strong leader and … posses the capability to reform the political dynamics and roll back much of the xenophobic wing of the fundamentalist evangelical movement" — Mohammad Elibiary |
Mohammad Elibiary, a long-time activist in Texas, gave this endorsement of McCain: "John McCain is a strong leader and on issues like comprehensive immigration reform posses the capability to reform the political dynamics and roll back much of the xenophobic wing of the fundamentalist evangelical (Christian Dominionist) movement. That kind of cultural reform will unleash much political room for new immigrant communities, which includes Muslims; and can only be delivered by a Republican in today's political environment."
Both Ahmed and Elibiary sounded off on two key points that many Muslims supporters of the GOP and McCain in this election often bring up; the cultural and moral values of conservatives, opposition to abortion and homosexuality, and support of other family values and gun-rights, (at least some facets of that movement) are closer to the Islamic ideal than that of liberals, thus making a more natural alliance for Muslims with conservatives. However, referring to a Jan. 2008 CAIR survey, only eight percent of Muslims are expected to vote Republican in the upcoming presidential elections.
In this particular election, many South Asian Muslims have been angered by the assertion of Obama that he will go into Pakistan if necessary to challenge Al-Qaeda and find Osama bin Laden (a policy the Bush Administration has began to implement over the last several weeks).
Revising "Disastrous Political Moves"
| "The right has used rhetoric to talk about values and morality, [yet] they have chosen policies that keep wealth in the hands of the few while the majority bear the burden" — Margari Aziza Hill |
"Nonsense," says Abdullah Hussein of St. Louis; "what will all those family values mean when we are all rounded up and shipped to Guantanamo Bay and having our mushafs [another word for Quran] desecrated by good ole' boys after the fears of Islam the public has have been stoked by the right-wing media and a McCain-Palin administration? Palin has already said that she believes that the war in Iraq was payback for 9/11; incase Iraq was guilty, what other Muslim nations could she possibly assign such guilt too [and thus ratify their attack]?"
Margari Aziza Hill, a PHD candidate in Islamic History from the Bay Area in California agrees "I think one of the most disastrous political moves Muslims made was to try to align themselves with the Christian right because of our shared conservative social values. I believe that the right has used rhetoric to talk about values and morality, but when it comes to caring about the suffering of others, they have chosen policies that keep wealth in the hands of the few while the majority bear the burden … I believe Obama and Biden are far more capable of leading America in a positive direction. They are the best choice we have and we need to take this opportunity to steer this ship around."
Hill and Hussein tend to support Obama for the same reasons that are common amongst his Muslim supporters in America (mounting to 49 percent of American Muslims — leaving 34 percent independents —, as Mr. Awad mentioned); they believe the GOP has promoted a climate of fear and distrust of Muslims, they believe elements of the conservative base are fundamentally exclusionary in nature, and they are concerned with the erosion of civil-liberties of American Muslims, and warfare abroad. Mr. Awad agrees, yet added some more factors expected to determine the Muslim vote; along with the war being fought abroad and civil rights challenges at home, he added education and health care.
Major Muslim organizations in America agree that what is more important than who Muslims would vote for is that they exercise their rights as citizens and cast ballots in this historical election.
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