On Monday, President Donald Trump added a golden oldie to his pre-election playlist. Tucked into his tweets about that caravan of would-be refugees walking their way north from Central America were the familiar strains of Islamophobia.
Between assertions that desperately poor, homeless people pose a grave threat to the nation, he claimed without evidence that the group of travelers includes “criminals and unknown Middle Easterners.”
It’s fair to assume he is simply scaring his supporters in an attempt to get them to the polls in two weeks. But civil rights activists always worry that such fear-mongering rhetoric can increase antipathy toward, and therefore make life more difficult for, American Muslims.
Encouraging new research suggests the population isn’t so easily swayed. It reports that, while many Americans still view Muslims with suspicion, even well-publicized terrorist attacks do not heighten those negative feelings….