Ahead of the presidential election, US Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign has expanded its reach to Arab and Muslim Americans, particularly in the battleground state of Michigan. But it is her Republican opponent, former President Donald Trump, who has made surprising gains with this group, which makes up a significant portion of voters angered by President Joe Biden’s policies in the Gaza war.

On Friday, Trump is expected to visit a halal cafe in Dearborn, Michigan, a city dubbed the Arab capital of America and home to nearly 400,000 Arab Americans. Many of them have expressed their determination to punish Harris over the Biden administration’s support of Israel.

Trump’s visit is a continuation of his outreach to the Arab and Muslim communities, which has earned him important support from leaders of two nearby Michigan cities that, while tiny, are symbolic. Bill Bazzi, the first Muslim and Arab-American mayor of Dearborn Heights, and Amer Ghalib, the Yemeni-American mayor of Hamtramck, the only U.S. city with an all-Muslim city council, have endorsed the Republican candidate.

“My meeting with President Trump was positive and we hope that he can change the current situation,” Ghalib told VOA. “He said he didn’t want wars and that he would listen to our concerns.”

Three of the six Hamtramck City Council members followed Ghalib’s endorsement and the rest endorsed Harris — a split that reflects the community’s polar views on the candidates.

“Harris has answered this question many times that she will work with Gaza. It will be fair to the people of Gaza,” Councilor Mohammed Alsomiri told VOA. “Trump, I don’t believe him and I don’t trust him.”

The former president courted the group intensively. At a rally last week in the Detroit suburb of Novi, about a half-hour drive from Dearborn, he said that Muslim and Arab voters “want an end to endless wars and a return to peace in the Middle East.” That’s all they want .”

Trump was joined on stage by what his campaign called “prominent leaders of Michigan’s Muslim community,” including Imam Belal Alzuhairi of the Great Mosque of Hamtramck.

“We as Muslims stand with President Trump because he promises peace, not war!” said Alzuhairi.

This is despite Trump hinting that he would give more leeway to Israel’s military offensives against Hamas and Hezbollah, and calling on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to “Do what you have to do” in a recent call will end the Middle East “in 24 hours” without explaining how.

As president in 2017, Trump called for a “complete and total lockdown” on Muslims and banned people from six Muslim-majority countries from entering the country, a policy that activists call “cruel, inhumane and violative of international law.”

The Trump campaign has not responded to VOA’s public relations requests.

Harris’ range

On the first anniversary of Hamas’ attack on Israel on October 7, 25 Muslim leaders published an open letter telling Muslim voters that supporting Harris “far outweighs the harms of the other options.”

The Harris campaign said it is working “hard” to engage the community. The vice president met twice with a small group of leaders in Michigan, in August in Detroit, shortly after she became the Democratic nominee, and in early October in Flint. She has since had another meeting with black imams and community leaders in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, another key swing state.

Afghan-American Nasrina Bargzie and Egyptian-American Brenda Abdelal, two lawyers who lead the Harris campaign’s Muslim and Arab outreach efforts, have met with groups in Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas, Minnesota, Arizona and Nevada met, the Harris campaign told VOA. Phil Gordon, Harris’ national security adviser, met virtually with leaders across the country in early October, the campaign said.

However, many of these meetings were with friendlier groups, suggesting that they were not aimed at changing hearts and minds. Gordon’s meeting excluded major Muslim and Arab organizations as well as pro-Palestinian activist groups and was more of a “check-the-box” event, according to James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute, who attended the eight-member meeting.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Harris’ vice presidential running mate, had a meeting with Arab and Muslim Americans, a virtual meeting in October with Engage Action, the political arm of an 18-year-old Muslim-American advocacy group that has already supported the Democratic presidential candidate in September.

Third party candidates

While polls suggest that support for Trump among Arab-Americans and Muslim Americans is unlikely to surpass that of Harris, they also show that third-party candidates could take a significant portion of the vote away from her. In Michigan, Green Party candidate Jill Stein has advocated for an “end to genocide.”

A poll released Friday by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the country’s largest Muslim advocacy group, found that 29.4% of American Muslims plan to vote for Harris, 29.1% for Stein and 11.2% for to vote for Trump. About 16.5% remain undecided.

The numbers suggest improvement for Harris and Trump in the group. Before Biden’s withdrawal, the CAIR poll showed Biden with 7.3% support and Trump with 4.9% support.

Compared to Biden, Harris was more vocal about his compassion for the Palestinians and called on Israel to “obey humanitarian law.” She also addressed the suffering in Lebanon and announced $157 million in government support.

At a Harris rally in Ann Arbor, Michigan, this week, Assad Turfe, an Arab-American official from nearby Wayne County, said Harris was a leader “who will give voice to our pain.”

But as with her various campaign rallies, Harris was harassed by pro-Palestinian protesters at this rally. “Hey guys, I hear you,” she said. “We all want this war to end as quickly as possible.”

To win, a candidate must receive at least 270 of 538 Electoral College votes. With 16 votes in the Electoral College, Michigan could tip the balance in what is expected to be a very close election. Biden won the state in 2020 with 154,000 more votes than Trump. In 2016, Trump won the state by nearly 11,000 votes over Hillary Clinton.

The Gaza war was a contentious issue in the community. At a press conference in Dearborn last week announcing Arab American leaders’ support for Harris, a group of Arab Americans who opposed Harris confronted them and called them traitors.

Ronald Stockton, a professor emeritus at the University of Michigan-Dearborn who has studied the community for decades, said he has never seen such polarization. He fears the community could be torn apart for good, regardless of who wins.

“There will be lasting scars,” Stockton told VOA, “like battlefield scars that remain decades after the war ends.”

VOA’s Iram Abbasi contributed to this report.