Study Shows American Attitudes on Arabs & Muslims Divided Along Political Party Lines
By Daniel Gil/ Contributing Writer
A new study released on Monday by the Arab American Institute (AAI) revealed Americans’ attitudes towards both Arabs and Muslims are sharply divided along political party lines with democrats harboring a more favorable view of them compared to republicans.
According to the study, 32 percent of republicans hold favorable views of Muslim Americans, a view which 31 percent of Trump supporters share. By contrast, 64 percent of Hillary Clinton supporters surveyed harbor favorable views of Muslims and Arabs, according to the study. However, since 2010, the total percentage of Americans who have a favorable view of Arabs and Muslims has not risen above 43 percent.
The Zogby Analytics poll covered a number of topics ranging from American opinions on Muslims and Arabs to immigration, civil rights, surveillance, and hate crimes. Over one thousand U.S. adults were surveyed to create the poll which was commissioned by AAI.
Since the polling began in 2010, the overall number of Americans who view Muslims and Arabs favorably decreased slowly, but steadily. In 2010, 43 percent of Americans viewed Arabs favorably compared to 35 percent in 2017. The percentage of Americans who viewed Muslims favorably in 2010 was 35, but in 2017, it’s 34 percent.
The study also found that roughly 37 percent of Americans claim they know someone who is either an Arab or a Muslim. The percentage of Trump supporters and republicans who say they know an Arab or a Muslim is slightly less at 33 percent. The percentage of democrats and Hillary Clinton supporters who know an Arab or a Muslim hovered above 42 percent.
Margaret Lowry, the special projects manager for AAI, was most surprised by this statistic, which she called “crazy” especially, when compared to the percentage breakdown of Americans who have either favorable or unfavorable views of Muslims and Arabs. She told Arab America that, “it speaks to an opportunity that exists for activists and advocacy groups to educate Americans about Arabs and American Muslims.” She continued by saying that she believed “it ends up being an issue of humanization.”
The data also revealed a majority of Trump supporters believe the U.S. should ban any immigrants and travelers from the Middle East. Just shy of 65 percent of Trump supporters agreed with this as opposed to 59 percent of Clinton supporters who believe people from the Middle East should be granted entry into the country.
In addition, the data suggests a majority of Americans want asylum for undocumented immigrants and support immigration policy which favors naturalization rather than expulsion. According to the polling data, over 55 percent of Americans want a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants; however, a majority of them are democrats, suggesting ideas on immigration policy are also divided starkly along party lines.
This was confusing for Lowry and I during the interview. But, Lowry suggested the “discrepancy,” as she put it, had to do with the way people speak about immigration when it comes to Arabs and Muslims. She reiterated she believed it was an issue of “humanizing Arabs and Muslims,” in the news and throughout media outlets.
Another key finding from the study concerned the perception of hate crimes against Muslims and Arabs that Americans have. Data collected on hate crimes annually by the FBI, along with the Council of Arab Islamic Relations, and the Arab American Institute shows incidents against Arabs and Muslims has increased since the 2016 Presidential election. The data continues the trend seen in aforementioned polls, showing a sharp politically partisan divide. According to the poll, 70 percent of democrats believe there has been an increase in hate crimes recently. However, only about a third of republicans believed there had been an increase.
Lowry says this may have to do with where people are getting their information. “It gets back to how we talk about it… Reports can be referred to very differently, depending on where you get your information from. It’s about whether or not they [the news] are painting the victim in a way that shows whether or not they were an American.”