Sunday, October 14, 2012
(Politico) - The Obama campaign is hosting an outreach event for Virginia-area Muslim Americans on Sunday, according to an invitation obtained by POLITICO.
Brian Moran, the chairman of the Virginia Democratic Party, will represent the Obama campaign as a surrogate at an event in Sterling, Va. at a local community center.
It's one of the first real outreach events this cycle by the Obama campaign to a community that is largely overlooked — and sometimes demonized — by both sides of the aisle.
There are more than 2 million Muslim-Americans in the United States, most of Arab, South-Asian and African-American decent.
That's less than 1 percent of the US population, but Muslim voters are concentrated in a number of states and major metropolitan areas — including the Virginia suburbs of Washington D.C.
According to research by Pew, Virginia is among the ten states with the highest number of Muslim Americans — and the only real contested swing state on that list aside from Ohio.
Those pockets of voters — by all indications, likely to vote for Obama — could play a role in a close state like Virginia. President Obama leads among Arab Muslim-Americans in a recent poll by a whopping 75 to 8 percent.
The Obama campaign has always treaded cautiously around the Muslim community — given the false and hysterical rumors that have circulated about Obama's own religious beliefs and background.
In a well publicized incident in 2008, two supporters wearing traditional headscarves were denied entry into an Obama event. The campaign later apologized. Read the full story here.
H/T: The Other News
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