- Muslim voters prioritize Gaza war over other issues
- Biden’s support among Muslims drops significantly
- Both parties seek to attract disenchanted Muslim voters
The race to recruit voters has heated up as the US presidential election approaches. Among the several constituencies that Democrats and Republicans are fighting over, one sticks out: the Muslim population.
Although Muslims account for only about one percent of the American population, they are an essential voting group because they are concentrated in swing states, which are frequently won by tight margins in elections.
In this election year, the Muslim community appears to be more united than ever before on a single political issue: the war in Gaza. Any politician wishing to win over big numbers of Muslim votes must address community demands for an end to the killing in Palestine.
This is according to a recent Institute for Social Policy and Understanding (ISPU) study in collaboration with Emgage and Change Research. It is based on a survey in late June and early July asking Muslims in three swing states – Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Michigan – how they plan to vote in the 2024 presidential election.
What we discovered is that President Joe Biden’s conduct in the Gaza war has changed Muslims, who were once among his staunchest fans, into his harshest critics.
In 2020, approximately 65% of Muslim voters in these states voted for Biden. This support was critical to his electoral triumph because he won important swing states by narrow margins. He won Georgia by only 12,000 votes, a state with over 61,000 Muslims, and Pennsylvania by 81,000 votes, a state with 125,000 Muslims.
In contrast, our study, done before Biden pulled out of the presidential campaign, found that only 12% of respondents said they would vote for him, a massive decline in support not seen in any other group surveyed. While this impacts the presidential race, it has also led to widespread discontent with the Democratic Party’s elite.
The war in Gaza has united Muslim voters in a way that no other topic has in recent history. According to the 2020 American Muslim Poll done by ISPU, the top voting topics for Muslim voters were healthcare (19%), the economy (14%), and social justice (13%).
Compare that to 2024: Across the partisan spectrum, Muslim voters in Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Michigan prioritize the conflict in Gaza (61 percent), followed by keeping the United States out of international wars (22%).
Reducing military funding to Israel also received support from the vast majority of Muslim voters in our study, who, regardless of political affiliation, overwhelmingly consider this policy as a reason to vote for a candidate. While war in another country may appear to be far removed from the daily problems of American Muslim voters, many regard the United States’ position in providing unconditional aid and diplomatic cover to Israel as complicit in the continuous persecution of Palestinians.
The significance of the Gaza war for Muslim voters became apparent months before we conducted our study. The Muslim community was a driving force behind the Uncommitted National Movement, which encouraged Democratic voters to vote “uncommitted” in presidential primaries in their respective states. More than 700,000 Democrats signed the effort, expressing their desire for a shift in the Biden administration’s tone and policy toward Israel and Palestine.
This substantial Muslim migration away from Biden is not a wholesale shift to the other side of the aisle. Muslim support for Trump has increased from 18 percent in 2020 to 22 percent in 2024 in Georgia, Michigan, and Pennsylvania.
Former Muslim supporters of Biden have overwhelmingly switched to third parties or remain uncertain. According to our findings, over a third of Muslim voters will either vote for a third-party candidate (27 percent) or write in a candidate (3 percent). Approximately 17% of Muslims said they have yet to choose a candidate, compared to 6% of the population.
This indicates that candidates still have the opportunity and time to win over this important group, and it appears they are trying.
Not only has Biden dropped out of the race, but Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris has indicated that she is distancing herself from his unwavering support for Israel’s war on Gaza. In July, the vice president did not attend Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to Congress. Still, she stated that she would not remain mute about the suffering in Gaza and expressed her support for a cease-fire.
Clinton chose Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running partner in August, primarily viewed as more sympathetic to the Palestinian cause than short-listed Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro. This year, Walz commended Minnesota’s undecided voters, calling them “civically engaged” and stating, “This issue is a humanitarian crisis.” They have the right to be heard.
Muslims were cautiously optimistic at best, but the Harris campaign’s reluctance to allow a Palestinian American to speak at the Democratic National Convention last week has dashed their hopes.
Jill Stein and Cornel West, both third-party candidates, strongly support Gazans. West selected Melina Abdullah, a Black Muslim woman, as his running mate. Stein chose Rudolph “Butch” Ware, a Muslim activist and educator.
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Even Republican nominee Donald Trump’s campaign is reaching out to Arab American voters, which is surprising given his anti-Muslim rhetoric when campaigning in 2016. People linked with his campaign have attempted to court Arab voters in battleground states. Tiffany, Trump’s youngest daughter, married the son of Massad Boulous, a Lebanese American businessman who has been trying to get Arabs in Michigan to vote for the former president in response to the present administration’s failing Gaza policy.
Many people have paid a high price as a result of the Muslim community’s mobilization in Palestine. The Council on American Islamic Relations reported an extraordinary jump in bias incidents in 2023, with a 56% increase in reports of Islamophobia. Anti-Palestinian prejudice has also increased significantly, as seen by the shooting of three Palestinian students in Vermont while wearing the keffiyeh scarf. Thousands of students, many of whom are Muslim, were jailed during campus rallies, and many were threatened with expulsion or criminal charges for their pro-Palestinian actions at colleges and universities around the United States.
Despite the penalties of having a public stance on Palestine, Muslim voters remain undeterred this time around. Solidarity with the people of Gaza has emerged as the single most crucial issue for American Muslim voters, and no candidate can afford to ignore it.
