Some members of Michigan’s religious minorities see their communities as under threat this election cycle.
Muslim Americans fear rising Islamophobia as attack ads show Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed superimposed over wreckage from September 11, 2001. There's no record of him supporting terrorism.
During an event hosted at a Canton children’s play space Tuesday, Democratic women gathered to call out the rhetoric.
Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (D-MI 12) said the attacks have created an anti-Muslim sentiment that even her kids have had to answer for.
“This is literally our daily lives, turning off the radio when an ad comes up. Turning the images that we get on our TV when we’re literally just trying to watch football or the series. We’re completely being bombarded by this dehumanization,” Tlaib said.
Tlaib and many others at the event blamed President Donald Trump for what they said is a rise in hate speech. Tlaib said the environment for immigrant and Muslim-American communities feels like it did in 2016 and 2017, when Trump first took office.
Trump won Michigan in 2022 thanks, in part, to his outreach paying off in cities with heavy Muslim populations like Dearborn and Hamtramck.
“Our communities are not photo opportunities; our communities are not campaign props. Our communities are not representative of all of us if you meet with a few of us,” businessowner Sara Khan said.
She chastised politicians for pandering.
“Respect for our communities cannot begin when you need our votes and end when you get them.”
Many of the women at Tuesday’s event identified as mothers. They feared the attacks against their communities would bleed into their children’s lives.
“We’re just moms first and want to protect our babies,” Tlaib said. “These are folks that are all in a space together because of our kids and we’re talking about just how ugly it’s gotten this year, and we’ve got to push back against it.”
Tuesday’s event also included women from Jewish and Christian backgrounds. The group expressed concern for rising hate speech targeting all religious minorities.
At a separate press conference earlier in the day, a group of rabbis continued to call for more measured language in Michigan’s U.S. Senate race. The group, Nonnegotiable Michigan, feels criticisms of Israel have waded into antisemitism and threatened Jewish safety.
Nonnegotiable accuses a political ad from the progressive organization Rebellion PAC of using anti-Jewish stereotypes to portray Jews as bloodthirsty. The video accuses El-Sayed’s Republican opponent Mike Rogers of caring too much about Israel and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The ad shows a couple at a grocery store discussing being unable to afford items because of the United States’ support for the Israeli government. The couple says that aid would go toward “killing Palestinians.”
The El-Sayed campaign stressed it was “not affiliated in any way” with the group or the advertisement in statements it provided to news outlets. It said it was focused on fighting high costs because of “President Trump’s agenda.”
But Rabbi Aaron Starr, who leads Congregation Shaarey Zedek in Southfield, said El-Sayed hasn’t done enough to denounce it.
“He’s not discrediting the commercial, he’s just distancing himself from it. He’s acknowledging he’s not the one that put it out,” Starr said during a Nonnegotiable press conference.
When asked if support for Rogers from openly racist people, like Jake Lang, gave them pause, the rabbis discussed feeling politically homeless.
“Nonnegotiable Michigan was founded with the idea that, because Jews have voted Democrat by a large majority over multiple generations, it is our obligation to call out extremism within our own party.” Starr said, "With the hope that people on the other side of the aisle, those who are multigenerational Republicans, will also call out extremism in their own party.”
On the flip side of the coin, a group called Michigan Jews for Democracy is circulating a letter calling on Jewish Democrats to support the El-Sayed campaign.
Division among minority groups has been a common theme in Michigan’s elections in recent years.
School principal Yvonne Lewis said she believes people at the top of the country's institutions are trying to turn Americans against one another by exploiting pain points.
“That visualization of seeing people in solidarity, they didn’t like it. So now, they have to do what they do best, right? Which is to separate, divide, and conquer, and it’s not really working,” Lewis said.
Lewis said she believes too many people have positive experiences with one another to truly fall for the stereotypes.
