US Senate hopeful Sharron Angle is on a roll. Not only has she aired a campaign ad so openly racist it could make Jesse Helms blush, she’s also telling voters that Muslim Americans have taken over and created “Sharia law” in some US towns.
The AP reports that audio of an Angle campaign event in Mesquite, Nevada, last week includes a man asking Angle: “I keep hearing about Muslims wanting to take over the United States … on a TV program just last night, I saw that they are taking over a city in Michigan and the residents of the city, they want them out. They want them out. So, I want to hear your thoughts about that.”
Rather than pointing out the question’s lunacy, Angle responds:
“We’re talking about a militant terrorist situation, which I believe it isn’t a widespread thing, but it is enough that we need to address, and we have been addressing it.”
“My thoughts are these, first of all, Dearborn, Michigan, and Frankford, Texas are on American soil, and under constitutional law. Not Sharia law. And I don’t know how that happened in the United States,” she said. “It seems to me there is something fundamentally wrong with allowing a foreign system of law to even take hold in any municipality or government situation in our United States.”
Dearborn is a Detroit suburb with a large, proud Muslim American community. Mayor Jack O’Reilly told AP Angle is parroting a tea party myth about the town. The myth started when anti-Islam protesters were arrested for harassing people at an Arab American cultural festival this summer. AP could offer no insight on why Angle brought up Frankford, Texas.
Ibrahim Hopper at the Council on American-Islamic Relations probably had the best explanation for both remarks: “This seems to be an example of incoherent bigotry. It is pretty clear that she has something against Islam and Muslims but she is so incoherent you don’t know what she stands for.”
Help Truthout resist the new McCarthyism
The Trump administration is cracking down on political dissent. Under pressure from an array of McCarthy-style tactics, academics, activists and nonprofits face significant threats for speaking out or organizing in resistance.
Truthout is appealing for your support to weather this storm of censorship. We’ve launched a fundraising campaign to find 267 new monthly donors in the next 48 hours. Will you be one?
As independent media with no corporate backing or billionaire ownership, Truthout is uniquely able to push back against the right-wing narrative and expose the shocking extent of political repression under the new McCarthyism. We’re committed to doing this work, but we’re also deeply vulnerable to Trump’s attacks.
Your support during our fundraiser (48 hours left!) will help us continue our nonprofit movement journalism in the face of right-wing authoritarianism. Please make a tax-deductible donation today.