Arab Americans Hear They Can Sway Presidential Election

By Ralph Dannheisser

As surrogates for Barack Obama and John McCain vied for Arab-American votes at a Virginia candidates forum sponsored by the Arab American Institute (AAI), the group's leaders urged attendees to volunteer and make their voices heard, regardless of party affiliation.

James Zogby, AAI founder and president, told some 320 persons at the October 5 forum in Arlington that their votes, recruitment of other voters and campaign donations could play a decisive role in Virginia.

Arab Americans also could have a major impact in other "battleground" states, including Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Florida, Zogby said.

The event featured officeholders and candidates from both major political parties, led by Virginia Governor Tim Kaine, a Democrat, and Republican Congressman Tom Davis, who spoke for presidential hopefuls Obama and McCain respectively.

Zogby set the tone by telling his audience it enjoys "growing influence in this state and, I think, in the country." With Virginia a key 2008 battleground state, "every vote will count. New communities are going to be critical, and we are one of those new communities."

The Arab-American population of Virginia is estimated at 135,000, with more than 60 percent of them living in the Washington suburbs.

AAI describes itself as a nonprofit organization committed to the civic and political empowerment of Americans of Arab descent, representing a constituency of almost 3.5 million nationwide. The event was part of its "Yalla Vote" effort. ("Yalla" is Arabic for "Let's go.")

ARAB AMERICANS SHARE CONCERNS OF MOST U.S. VOTERS

Zogby said the priorities of Arab Americans are identical to those of American voters generally.

"There is no separation between what's important to us and what's important to the country. Our issues have converged." Domestically, a shrinking economy and "erosion of our civil liberties" are shared concerns, Zogby said.

Internationally, he said, the Middle East is at the center of most Americans' concerns, with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict a key component.

Urging those present to volunteer their services to their favored candidate, Zogby told them AAI has developed a database of potential Arab-American voters in the battleground states, and encouraged them to use the AAI phone-banking tool to contact those voters.

"Our ability to survive in the world and make a difference in the world as a community and as a country is at stake in this election," he said.

PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN SURROGATES APPEAL FOR SUPPORT

Kaine, a national co-chair of the Obama campaign, termed this "a time of fundamental choice for our nation ... the most challenging set of circumstances since FDR became president in 1933."

He lauded Obama as exemplifying excellence and being a "true unifier" and "the change maker that we need in this country."

"This state is poised right on the knife edge right now," Kaine said, asserting that Arab-Americans "have the capacity to make this race tip one way or the other." The political map suggests "if Senator Obama gets the 13 electoral votes of Virginia, there is no way that Senator McCain can be elected president," he said.

Davis, retiring at the end of 2008 from the House of Representatives after serving 14 years, cited energy independence, immigration reform and the mushrooming national debt as key issues that McCain is ready to address effectively. With respect to the debt, he said that "going the way we're going means we're the airplane flying into the mountain."

"What we need is a leader who works across party lines. ... I think this is where John McCain has excelled," Davis said, citing stances on issues from financial reforms and immigration to torture and the Guantanamo Bay prison.

"His opponent has talked about bipartisanship, but when you look at the record, there is only one major issue that he has voted against his party on with the majority of Republicans, and that's FISA [the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act]," he said.

Audience reaction suggested most support Obama. That meshed with the findings of a national poll conducted in September by Zogby International, headed by James Zogby's brother, John, in which 501 Arab-American respondents favored Obama by a margin of 54 percent to 33 percent. The poll found jobs and the economy to be their most important issues, followed by the war in Iraq/peace/foreign affairs, and health care.

Noting the poll was taken before the dramatic upheaval in financial markets, Nadine Wahab, AAI's public affairs manager, told America.gov that Obama's lead has almost surely widened since the poll was conducted.

CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATES WEIGH IN

Other forum participants included Democratic Congressman Jim Moran and the challenger for his Northern Virginia seat, Republican Mark Ellmore. Both strove to connect with their Arab-American audience.

Ellmore reminded them, in Arabic, that his wife is Palestinian, and added, "My son is an Arab-American Palestinian American serving in the United States Air Force."

He drew applause and cheers when he said, "We need to get back to the pre-'67 borders for the Palestinian people," and added, "We need to make it so we have peace. Arabs don't hate Jews, they hate Zionism."

Moran said the Israeli-Palestinian conflict "is at the heart of how so many people think of America, define America's values." Joining Ellmore's call for a return by Israel to its 1967 borders, he urged "that we share Jerusalem as the capital city, that we get a truly economically viable Palestinian state, that the Golan Heights be controlled by Syria."

"We can resolve this crisis, we can do that, [with] a president that's determined to do that," Moran said. "The American Jewish community wants peace."

Source: U.S. Department of State

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