Ahead of Election Day 2024, Donald Trump invested some time and effort trying to win over Arab American and Muslim voters, most notably in Michigan, hoping to take advantage of the community’s opposition to the Biden administration’s policies in Israel. The outreach paid dividends: The Republican posted significant gains in areas such as Dearborn, where more than half of residents are of Middle Eastern descent.
It’s likely that many of these voters knew they were taking a risk. After all, Trump’s record of anti-Muslim rhetoric and policies is well documented. During his 2016 campaign, the Republican went so far as to say, “I think Islam hates us” — as if Muslims and Americans are, practically by definition, different things.
More recently, Trump used the word “Palestinian” as a slur and indicated that he’s prepared to expand his notorious Muslim ban.
Nevertheless, the Republican won a second term — and narrowly flipped Michigan from blue to red — at which point he started making personnel moves during his presidential transition period. In December, Reuters and The Associated Press published reports on Arab American voters in Michigan who had backed Trump a month earlier and were feeling dismay over some of his selections.
The AP report noted that those with concerns specifically pointed to former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Trump’s choice for ambassador to Israel. “Huckabee has consistently rejected the idea of a Palestinian state in territories seized by Israel, strongly supported Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and opposed a two-state solution, claiming ‘there really isn’t such a thing’ as Palestinians in referring to the descendants of people who lived in Palestine before the establishment of Israel,” the article explained.
No one should be surprised if there’s another round of similar reporting in the coming days. NBC News reported:
President Donald Trump said Saturday that he has asked the king of Jordan to take in more Palestinians, adding that Palestinians should leave the Gaza Strip to “clean out” the enclave. The president’s comments, which key figures from Israel’s far right have taken as a boost, came as thousands of Palestinians waited to return to their homes in northern Gaza after the Israeli government accused Hamas of breaching a ceasefire agreement and refused to open crossing points.
“You’re talking about probably a million and a half people, and we just clean out that whole thing,” Trump told reporters Saturday. He went on to raise the prospect of transferring at least some of Gaza’s population to Jordan and Egypt.
What’s more, the Republican president went on to say that the resettling of the Palestinians from Gaza “could be temporary or long-term.”
As is often the case with Trump’s comments, it was unclear whether he was simply blurting out a random thought or presenting the public with a new administration policy. Either way, The Washington Post’s David Ignatius explained in his latest column that the president’s public statement “astonished moderate Arab leaders who had been looking forward to working with him. Relocation of Palestinians could destabilize moderate Arab governments across the region. Trump enjoys being a disruptor, but this was closer to tossing a grenade.” It also comes against a backdrop of reports that Trump approved giving Israel 2,000-pound bombs, which the Biden administration had paused in response to concerns Israel’s conduct in Gaza. The president didn’t explicitly confirm the reporting, though he did publish an item to his social media platform on Saturday that read, “A lot of things that were ordered and paid for by Israel, but have not been sent by Biden, are now on their way!” That followed Republican confirmation of Pete Hegseth, Trump’s choice to lead the Pentagon, despite his own record of anti-Muslim rhetoric. And that followed Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, Trump’s choice to serve as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, saying during a Senate confirmation hearing that she believes Israel has a biblical right to the entire West Bank.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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