Influx of Muslims Running for Public Office

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Radical Islam and its associated acts of terrorism have been reported from multiple European countries and are an ever-present menace in the Middle East. President Trump campaigned on promises to protect the United States from radical Islamic terrorism and took a significant step toward fulfilling this promise early in his incumbency with an executive action banning inbound travel from seven Muslim-majority nations: Syria, Iraq, Iran, Lybia, Somalia, the Sudan, and Yemen. In response to this, many Muslims express feelings of victimization, claiming that this is one of several forms of persecution as opposed to protection from terrorist infiltration.

In response to feeling persecuted, Muslim Americans are now running for various public offices in greater numbers. Farrah Khan, for example, is a Pakistani-American Muslim running for city council in Irvine, California. She was previously an organizer for another candidate’s city council campaign because, though she had considered running personally, local Democrats told her to wait her turn to run and, instead, support another. She originally fell in line but then eventually decided to ignore party affiliates and run for city council. She received support from an organization called the New American Leaders Project (NALP), a group that concerns itself specifically with politically supporting immigrants running for office in the U.S.