A coalition of Muslim leaders from several swing states have launched a campaign against President Joe Biden's reelection, citing his refusal to support a ceasefire amid fighting in Gaza.
On October 7, Hamas led the deadliest Palestinian militant attack on Israel in history. Israel subsequently launched its heaviest-ever airstrikes on Gaza. Israeli officials have said that 1,200 people in Israel were killed in Hamas' attack, according to the Associated Press, while over 13,300 Palestinians have been killed, officials from the health ministry in Gaza said.
Protests have erupted across the U.S. in support of a ceasefire in Gaza and voicing concerns over the treatment of Palestinian civilians. Biden, who has remained unwavering in his support for Israel's right to self-defense, has received criticism from both pro-Palestinian protestors and progressive members of Congress for refusing to call for a ceasefire.
On Saturday, Biden was faced with a new challenge that may potentially shape the outcome of the 2024 presidential election, in a race that will likely be between him and GOP frontrunner, former President Donald Trump.
Muslim community leaders from the critical swing states of Michigan, Minnesota, Arizona, Wisconsin, Florida, Georgia, Nevada, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania, gathered at a press conference in Dearborn, Michigan, to launch their #AbandonBiden campaign on a national scale.
Newsweek reached out to the White House via email for comment.
"We believe that we are not going to allow this country to continue to uplift the military industrial complex and continue to get us into wars and continue to not value life," Jaylani Hussein, director of the Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), told Newsweek via telephone on Sunday. Hussein is not representing CAIR on the #AbandonBiden campaign and CAIR is not endorsing this work.
"And also use our resources that are precious to many Americans for war rather than for peace and for harmony around the world."
The Muslim leaders pledged to withdraw their support of Biden's 2024 campaign.
"We are not powerless as American Muslims. We are powerful. We don't only have the money, but we have the actual votes. And we will use that vote to save this nation from itself," Hussein said at Saturday's press conference.
Biden won against Trump in the key swing states where the Muslim coalitions are from by slim margins in 2020, including North Carolina by 0.3 percent and Georgia by 0.2 percent.
Support for Biden among the Arab American community has drastically dropped from 2020 when the majority voted for the president.
In a poll conducted by the Arab American Institute from October 23 to October 27 with a sample size of 500 Arab Americans and a margin of error of 4.5 percent, only 17 percent of Arab American voters said that they will vote for Biden in 2024.
"American Muslims are shocked and dismayed that the fact that we have historically voted for the Democrats and here we voted for President Biden," Hussein told Newsweek. "And he's unable to see that humanity in Palestinian children."
Hussein continued, "And so therefore, this is not a debate within the Muslim community. The overwhelming majority of Muslims have told us and shared with us in our mosques and our community groups, they can never see themselves voting for the president in the upcoming election."
When asked if the Muslim community would vote for Biden if the president were to call a ceasefire, Hussein said, "I think it's the right thing to do," regarding the ceasefire, "but I don't see the Muslim Americans trusting him beyond this election."
However, the coalition does not plan to vote for Trump either, if he were to win the GOP nomination.
"We don't only have two options. We have many options, including independent candidates and others," Hussein told Newsweek. "And that decision will be determined by the community as this effort continues to grow and we begin the process of recognizing who is probably a better option for the Muslim community."
Update 12/3/23, 4:19 p.m. ET: This article has been updated to reflect Hussein's association with CAIR on the #AbandonBiden campaign.
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