(NewsNation) — Some of President-elect Donald Trump’s administration picks — including tapped Secretary of State Marco Rubio, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee and U.N. Ambassador Elise Stefanik — have made caustic remarks about the Muslim community in the past.
Muslims for Trump co-founder Rabiul Chowdhury tells “Dan Abrams Live” the nominations are concerning for his Muslim supporters who expected an “America First” approach rather than one focused on Israel.
“Some of his picks, like Marco Rubio, in our opinion, did not align with his America First and his vision of peace,” Chowdhury explained, telling NewsNation they would rather see Richard Grenell in the Cabinet.
While Chowdhury says Muslim voters stand by their pick, the support shift could be spoiled by pro-Israel nominations.
“Yes, some of his picks are not favorable based on their past rhetoric, but there is no regret when we launched the Abandon Biden, Abandon Harris or even Muslims for Trump,” Chowdhury said. “We did consider his past presidency.”
As president in 2017, Trump signed an executive order temporarily banning travelers from several Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States.
In 2023, then-candidate Trump vowed to reinstate the Muslim travel ban, telling the Republican Jewish Coalition: “Just as I did before, we will keep radical Islamic terrorists the hell out of our country.”
A nationwide exit poll by the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) found that less than 50% of Muslim voters backed Harris compared to President Joe Biden’s 65% in 2020.
Among the reasons some Arab American voters supported Trump was that they believed his prominent supporters would be key in the next administration.
Osama Siblani, publisher of the Dearborn-based Arab American News, which declined to endorse a candidate in the presidential race, told The Associated Press: “But now people are coming to us and saying, ‘Look what you’ve done.'”
“We had a choice between someone actively shooting and killing you and someone threatening to do so. We had to punish the person who was shooting and killing us at the time,” he added.
NewsNation’s Tanya Noury and The Associated Press contributed to this report.