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By Andrea Shalal
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Some Arab American and Muslim voters angry at U.S. support for Israel's offensive in Gaza are shunning Democrat Kamala Harris in the presidential race to back third-party candidate Jill Stein in numbers that could deny Harris victories in battleground states that will decide the Nov. 5 election.
A late August poll conducted by the Council on American-Islamic Relations advocacy group showed that in Michigan, home to a large Arab American community, 40% of Muslim voters backed the Green Party's Stein. Republican candidate Donald Trump got 18%, with Harris, who is President Joe Biden's vice president, trailing at 12%.
The poll, conducted by text message more than two weeks before the Harris-Trump Sept. 10 debate, showed Harris leading Trump 29.4% to 11.2%, with 34% favoring third-party candidates including Stein at 29.1%.
Harris was the leading pick of Muslim voters in Georgia and Pennsylvania, while Trump prevailed in Nevada with 27%, just ahead of Harris' 26%, according to the CAIR poll of 1,155 Muslim voters nationwide. All are battleground states that have swung on narrow margins in recent elections.
The Green Party is on most state ballots, including all battleground states that could decide the election, except for Georgia and Nevada, where the party is suing to be included.
Stein also leads Harris among Muslims in Arizona and Wisconsin, battleground states with sizable Muslim populations where Biden defeated Trump in 2020 by slim margins.
Biden won the 2020 Muslim vote, credited in various exit polls with from 64% to 84% of their support, but Muslim backing of Democrats has fallen sharply since Israel's nearly year-long action in Gaza.
The Uncommitted National Movement said on Thursday it would not back Harris even though it opposes Trump and won't recommend a third-party vote. It said Trump would accelerate the killing in Gaza if reelected but Harris had not responded to its request she meet with Palestinian Americans who lost loved ones in Gaza and had not agreed to discuss halting arms shipments to Israel.
A campaign spokesperson said Harris was committed to earning every vote and uniting the country, while continuing to work to end the war in Gaza. The campaign earlier declined to comment on the shifting dynamics; officials tasked with Muslim outreach were not available for interviews.
The Uncommitted movement rallied over 750,000 voters to cast uncommitted ballots in the Democratic nominating contests early this year to protest Biden's policy in support of Israel's war. Biden left the race in July and endorsed Harris, who then launched her campaign.
Harris has gone further than other Biden administration officials to voice sympathy with the Palestinians and has forcefully criticized Israel’s conduct while adhering to Biden administration policy, disappointing Arab American and Muslim voters.
About 3.5 million Americans reported being of Middle Eastern descent in the 2020 U.S. Census, the first year such data was recorded. Although they make up about 1% of the total U.S. population of 335 million, their voters may prove crucial in a race that opinion polls show Harris and Trump neck and neck.
On Tuesday, Harris called for an end to the Israel-Gaza war and the return of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. She also said Israel must not reoccupy the Palestinian enclave and backed a two-state solution.
But at closed-door meetings in Michigan and elsewhere, Harris campaign officials have rebuffed appeals to halt or limit U.S. arms shipments to Israel, community leaders say.
"Decades of community organizing and civic engagement and mobilizing have not manifested into any benefit," said Faye Nemer, founder of the Michigan-based MENA American Chamber of Commerce to promote U.S. trade with the Middle East.
"We're part of the fabric of this country, but our concerns are not taken into consideration," she said.
Stein is aggressively campaigning on Gaza, while Trump representatives are meeting with Muslim groups and promising a swifter peace than Harris can deliver.
Stein's 2016 run ended with just over 1% of the popular vote, but some Democrats blamed her and the Green Party for taking votes away from Democrat Hillary Clinton. Pollsters give Stein no chance of winning in 2024.
But her support for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza, for an immediate U.S. arms embargo on Israel and for student movements to force universities to divest from weapons investments have made her popular in pro-Palestinian circles. Her running mate Butch Ware, a professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, is Muslim.
This month Stein spoke at ArabCon in Dearborn, Michigan, an annual gathering of Arab Americans, and was featured on the cover of The Arab American News under the headline "The Choice 2024." Last week in an interview with The Breakfast Club, a New York radio program, she said, "Every vote cast for our campaign is a vote against genocide," a charge that Israel denies.
TRUMP TEAM CAMPAIGNS FOR ARAB AMERICAN VOTES
At the same time, the Trump team has hosted dozens of in-person and virtual events with Arab Americans and Muslims in Michigan and Arizona, said Richard Grenell, Trump's former acting Director of National Intelligence.
"Arab American leaders in Detroit know this is their moment to send a powerful message to the Democrat party that they shouldn’t be taken for granted," Grenell said. Trump has said he would secure more Arab-Israeli peace deals.
Biden defeated Trump in 2020 by just thousands of votes in some states, thanks in part to the support of Arab and Muslim voters in states where they are concentrated, including Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
Biden won Michigan by 154,000 votes in 2020, but Trump defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton there by fewer than 11,000 votes in 2016. The state is home to overlapping groups of more than 200,000 registered voters who are Muslim and 300,000 who report ancestry from the Middle East and North Africa.
In Philadelphia, which has a large Black Muslim population, activists have joined a national "Abandon Harris" campaign. They helped organize protests during her debate with Trump last week.
Philadelphia CAIR co-chair Rabiul Chowdhury said, "We have options. If Trump pledges to end the war and bring home all hostages, it's game over for Harris." Trump has said the war would never have erupted if he were president. It's unclear how he would end it. Trump is a firm supporter of Israel.
(Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Heather Timmons and Howard Goller)
