WASHINGTON (Reuters) - US Muslim leaders who supported Republican Donald Trump in protest against the Biden administration’s support for Israel’s war on Gaza and attacks on Lebanon told Reuters they have been deeply disappointed by his cabinet picks.
“Trump won because of us, and we’re not happy with his secretary of state pick and others,” said Rabiul Chowdhury, a Philadelphia investor who chaired the Abandon Harris campaign in Pennsylvania and co-founded Muslims for Trump.
Muslim support for Trump helped him win Michigan and may have factored into other swing state wins, strategists believe.
Trump picked Republican Senator Marco Rubio (R-Florida), a staunch supporter of Israel, for secretary of state.
Earlier this year, Rubio said he would not call for a ceasefire in Gaza and that he believed Israel should destroy “every element” of Hamas. “These people are vicious animals,” he said.
Trump also nominated fellow Republican Mike Huckabee – a former Arkansas governor and staunch pro-Israel conservative who backs Israeli sovereignty over the West Bank and has called a two state solution “unworkable” – as the next ambassador to Israel.
Trump's pro-Israel picks
The president-elect also picked Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY, 21st District), who called the UN a “cesspool of antisemitism” for its condemnation of deaths in Gaza, to serve as US ambassador to the United Nations.
Rexhinaldo Nazarko, executive director of the American Muslim Engagement and Empowerment Network (AMEEN), said Muslim voters had hoped Trump would choose cabinet officials who work toward peace and that there was no sign of that.
“We are very disappointed,” he said. “It seems like this administration has been packed entirely with neoconservatives and extremely pro-Israel, pro-war people, which is a failure on the on the side of President Trump to the pro-peace and anti-war movement.”
Nazarko said the community would continue pressing to make its voices heard about ending the war in Gaza. “At least we’re on the map,” he said.
Hassan Abdel Salam, a former professor at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, and co-founder of the Abandon Harris campaign, which endorsed Green Party candidate Jill Stein, said Trump’s staffing plans were not surprising but had proven even more extreme than he had feared.
“It’s like he’s going on Zionist overdrive,” Salam said. “We were always extremely skeptical... Obviously we’re still waiting to see where the administration will go, but it does look like our community has been played.”
The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
Several Muslim and Arab Trump supporters said they hoped Richard Grenell, Trump’s former acting director of national intelligence, would play a key role after he led months of outreach to Muslim and Arab American communities and was even introduced at events as a potential incoming secretary of state.
Another key Trump ally, Massad Boulos, the Lebanese father-in-law of Trump’s daughter Tiffany, met repeatedly with Arab American and Muslim leaders.
Both promised Arab American and Muslim voters that Trump was a candidate for peace who would act swiftly to end the wars in the Middle East and beyond. Neither was immediately reachable.
Trump made several visits to cities with large Arab American and Muslim populations, including a stop in Dearborn, Michigan, a majority Arab city, where he said he loved Muslims, and Pittsburgh, PA, where he called Muslims for Trump “a beautiful movement. They want peace. They want stability.”
Bill Bazzi, mayor of neighboring Dearborn Heights, who endorsed Trump, said he met the president-elect three times and still believed he would work to end the war, despite the cabinet appointments.
Rola Makki, Lebanese American and Muslim vice chair of outreach for the Michigan Republican Party, agreed.
“I don’t think everyone’s going to be happy with every appointment Trump makes, but the outcome is what matters,” she said.
“I do know that Trump wants peace, and what people need to realize is that there’s 50,000 dead Palestinians and 3,000 dead Lebanese, and that’s happened during the current administration.”