In Florida, a national Muslim organization, the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) ran special buses from Islamic centers to the polling booths for Muslim voters. In Virginia, the Washington D.C. area and New York, dozens of Muslim cab drivers ferried Muslim voters to polling stations free of charge. In Ohio, volunteers from CAIR and other Muslim groups called several thousand Muslim voters to remind them of their obligation to add their voice to the American political system.
“Wherever we went, we found an unusual level of enthusiasm amongst the Muslim voters,” said Muawiz Siddiqui, a freelance Pakistani journalist and a contributor to the Muslims Weekly, after visiting several hotly contested constituencies in the Florida and Washington area with BBC. According to Siddiqui, he found 100 percent support for John Kerry amongst the Muslim voters at several polling stations in Florida and elsewhere. However, it was not so in New York, where President Bush did have some support amongst Muslim voters. “I will vote for Bush. I have convinced six of my friends as well,” said Ajmal, a Pakistani limo driver and a staunch Bush supporter.
The decision of the American Muslim Taskforce for Election 2004 to vote for John Kerry seemed to be received very well at the community level; however, many of its critics accused it [the organization] of just endorsing the Muslim public opinion polls, instead of getting any pledges from the Democratic Party for its support. Public opinion polls, ahead of the American Muslim Taskforce decision, spoke of an overwhelming support for John Kerry amongst the Muslims.
American Muslim Taskforce chairman Professor Agha Saeed said that the Muslim voter national turnout could be the highest in American Muslims’ political history. “We are working on the data to determine exactly what percentage of Muslim voters cast their votes,” he said. Agha Saeed said exit polls conducted by the American Muslim Alliance suggested that 91 percent of the Muslim voters cast their votes for Kerry. Another exit poll conducted by CAIR amongst 537 Muslim voters, said 93 percent of Muslims said they voted for Kerry, 5 percent favored Ralph Nader and less than 1 percent said they supported President Bush.
Agha Saeed said the American Muslim Taskforce’s block vote decision was a step in the right direction; through coalition building, it ultimately took the shape of the popular vote. He said a higher Muslim voter turnout was not surprising keeping in view the national trend, yet it was “quite exclusive” to Muslims. He said the Muslims support for Kerry had proved their earlier prediction as correct. The American Muslim Taskforce, it may be recalled, had predicted at the time of endorsing Kerry that over 90 percent of the Muslim vote would go to the Democratic Party candidate.
When asked what would be his reaction if President Bush wins a second term, Agha Saeed said Bush re-election would help them build a national civil rights coalition. He added that the Muslim leadership had been working on it for a while.
Dr. Zahid H. Bukhari, a principal investigator for the Pew Project, “Muslim Community in American Public Life,” and a Fellow at the Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown University, said that irrespective of whom they are supporting, the overall trends among Muslim voters auger well for them as a community. He believed that the brighter side of the 9/11 fallout for the Muslim community was showcased well on Tuesday through its turnout, which is believed to be many times higher than in 2000 and in 1996. “Muslim voters seem to be relatively more conscious and active this time around,” he added. He believed that the signs of political maturity in the Muslim community were now more visible than before and referred to research studies that point to increasing Muslim participation in national affairs; however, he cautioned the community not to expect too much from their nascent political activism, as it would take some time to have real and desired political impact.
