The reason three times as many Muslims voted for Trump compared to Romney
A poll released last week by the Council on American-Islamic Relations found that President-elect Donald Trump garnered nearly three times as many votes from Muslim-American men and women than Mitt Romney did during his unsuccessful bid for the White House in 2012.
The CAIR exit poll of more than 2,000 registered Muslim voters found that 74 percent voted for Hillary Clinton and 13 percent voted for Trump. CAIR’s 2012 exit poll showed 85.7 percent of Muslims voted for President Barack Obama and 4.4 percent voted for Romney.
During Trump’s campaign for the presidency, he released a plan to ban Muslims from entering the United States. The New York Times wrote a story in March that Muslims were attempting to drive up turnout from their community in an effort to defeat Trump.
“Muslims were more energized and engaged this election than ever before, turning out in record numbers,” Robert McCaw, CAIR director of government affairs department, said in a press release.
Why were Muslim voters more motivated to turn out for Trump than for Romney? And why did media outfits like the New York Times fail to pick up on this significant minority of Muslim men and women who voted for the tough-talking business mogul?
Muslim-Americans turned out for Trump because they too are concerned and can attest to the devastating effects posed by radical Islamic terrorism.
As Asra Nomani, a Muslim-American immigrant and former Wall Street Journal reporter who voted for Trump, says in a post-election piece, “As a liberal Muslim who has experienced first-hand Islamic extremism in this world, I have been opposed to the decision by President Obama and the Democratic Party to tap dance around the ‘Islam’ in Islamic State.”
The issue of Islamic terrorism is a bi-partisan one, as Ms. Nomani – self-described as socially liberal – says she voted for President Obama in 2008 and 2012 but became increasingly alarmed by President Obama’s politically correct policies in regard to terror and thus favors Trump on the subject.
“[Trump] is insensitive at times with what he says and his proposals are tough, but they reflect a reality of concern people have about an issue that’s killing people from Orlando to Paris,” she told Fox News.