I get attacked because of my faith.
I'm Muslim American.
My name is Nabilah Islam.
And they're like, "Oh, well, we don't need Muslims in
government."
Or "You need to get out of our country."
Some person told me if I don't keep my tone
down, they'll put me in a camp.
Donald Trump says something insane and then
my email, my social media just spikes with hate.
Hopefully this isn't breaking news to you,
but 2020 is a major election year and we here
at State of Grace thought it would be a great
time to look at how a candidate's religious
background is packaged and leveraged
during a campaign season.
It's no secret that Christianity is the majority
religion of our representatives.
While Donald Trump has embraced a base of
white evangelical support, his administration
has perpetuated a hostile environment for non-Christians.
Donald Trump has got to go.
In spite of this divisive rhetoric and policy, we're
seeing an exciting wave of change in
elections at every level.
Candidates of minority faiths are running in
unprecedented numbers.
Ilhan Ohmar and Rasheeda Tlaib made history
in 2018 when they became the first Muslim
woman elected to Congress.
They're part of a new era of representation
that is younger, more progressive, and led
by women.
These change makers are forging an unprecedented
path to office, literally writing the book
on how to run as a non-Christian candidate in America.
But while this movement is gaining traction,
candidates striving for change in conservative
strongholds still face an uphill battle.
Meet Nabilah Islam.
Make sure you bundle up and we're gonna be
knocking on doors.
Nabilah is a working class progressive through
and through, advocating for Medicare for all,
a green new deal, and reproductive justice.
She quit her job to run a completely
grassroots campaign full time.
A Muslim woman and a daughter of Bangladeshi
immigrants, Nabilah is seeking to flip Georgia's
7th Congressional District and give her home
the authentic representation
she never saw growing up.
Gwinnett is where I grew up.
We have so much diversity.
We're the actually the fourth most diverse
county in the entire country.
But what does a Muslim candidacy look like
in a post-Trump election cycle, especially
in a county that has been red since 1995?
For so long, we've never had reflective representation
of our diversity or values.
That's been just very evident by the fact that
our community has been left behind.
Is there a position that you hold that is the most
controversial when you talk to voters?
I think when I say that ICE has no place in our
communities, people are just like, "Woah,
that's a strong stance.
Right.
ICE has really been such a terror in this community.
I am running for office because I really want
to give this community a voice, like a voice
it's never had before.
No one like me has ever run for office before
in Georgia.
Or there's been very few in the country.
This is the "Foffice," our field office, where
we strategize and figure out what doors we're
going to knock.
Nice.
And then in here is my office where I call voters.
How many hours would you say that you
spend on the phone?
At least 40 hours.
So...
Of just the phone?
I've called probably, up to this point, probably
over sixty five, seventy thousand...
Made seventy thousand phone calls.
When I was in the seventh grade, I had a drama
teacher that couldn't, for the life of them,
pronounce my name.
He was writing out nah-bil-ah and he went
N-A-B-I-L-L-Y.
Yeah.
He's like, you're going to be Billy from now on.
When I announced I was gonna run for office,
there were a lot of people that were like,
"Oh, you should go by Billy.
It's easier to say.
It's southern."
People would be like, "oh, your name
sounds foreign."
I'm like, what does that mean, though?
This country is a land of immigrants.
Like, we all have unique names
and we're all American.
I think Nabilah Islam is an American name.
Before a busy day of campaigning, we headed
to a local diner to fuel up with Nabilah and
her parents.
Did you grow up in this area?
Yes.
Okay.
My mom, the first five years of my life,
she worked at a Hardy's flipping burgers not too
far from here.
Right there, on the corner.
Right there, on the corner!
So when you were in high school, were you already
thinking about maybe going into politics?
I actually...
So, when I got to college, I was a political science major.
Okay.
And I was like, all right, "I'm going to get this
political science major and like, get
into politics somehow" and...
Yeah.
And then I was given an assignment
to interview a person in politics.
So I was like, "alright,
I'm going to go interview my government teacher."
He was basically like, "well, politics is reserved
for people that...
Whose parents are wealthy, and so they have
like all of those connections and like, it's
really hard for women."
Your politics teacher just came in hot being like,
"I'm going to burst your bubble real quick."
That conversation was so pivotal in my life,
more so than he will ever know.
And I changed my degree to marketing like that week.
I was like...
And I remember thinking to myself, like,
"I'm 18 years old, like, who am I to
break this glass ceiling?"
Were you immediately supportive when Nabilah
was like, I'm going to run for Congress?
Yes, oh yeah I'm proud.
Yeah.
Okay.
Let's rewind.
When I got...
Oh wait.
She's like, wait a second.
When I got involved in politics, Mom was like,
"what are you doing?
I came to this country and broke my back
to give you an education.
You're getting involved in campaigns?"
My friends, actually were like "I'm not surprised.
I saw this coming."
Yeah I guess the writing was probably
on the wall.
The race for the Seventh District is tight.
But Nabilah has been building momentum,
largely due to her rigorous ground strategy.
We're going to go canvass, knock on thousands
of doors, get the word out about this campaign.
My name is Nabilah Islam.
Nabilah Islam.
As a grassroots campaign, Nabilah doesn't accept
any PAC or corporate money.
I'm running for Congress in this district.
She campaigns full time.
I wanted to see if you plan on voting on May 19th.
Pounding the pavement, meeting voters,
shaking hands and phone banking with a committed
team of volunteers.
Hi, Gilda.
My name is me Nabilah Islam.
I'm running for U.S. Congress.
I wanted to see what are some issues that you both
care about?
School...education.
Education.
Good teachers and...
Well, in Congress, we'll be able to use our budgeting
powers to make sure that all schools
receive equal funding.
We'll be supporting you.
Thank you so much.
Thank you!
Good luck with the election.
Thank you.
Nabilah constantly engages in one on one
conversations with constituents
and has to be prepared
to address any and all questions as they relate
to her policies or her personal life, including
questions about her faith.
Has it been an issue that people want
to discuss your faith?
My name is a statement in of itself.
So it comes up.
You'll have some people be like, "that's great.
We need more Muslims in office."
Or you might have someone that is just like
"I'm a Christian first."
And so they're not open to the idea
of a person of Muslim faith being in office.
I'm struck by the extreme
double standard Nabilah is up against just
by virtue of belonging to a religion that
is not Christianity.
We don't see that same level of scrutiny applied to
candidates who advertise their Christian
affiliation.
I went to speak with Dr. Andra Gillespie,
a political analyst and election expert, to
get a better understanding of the origins of white
evangelical influence within politics.
Has it always been the way that white evangelicals
have been so tightly affiliated with the Republican
Party?
By the end of the 1970s, we start to see the rise
of Christian political groups that are mobilizing
around social issues.
So they're mobilizing around abortion, they're
mobilizing around gay rights.
Faith is a branding thing for a candidate.
We're just seeing how that is totally different
between like a Mike Pence/Donald Trump versus
any candidate on the Democratic side.
While President Trump has more tenuous ties
to evangelical Christianity, he recognized
that white evangelicals were the
base of the Republican Party.
It was an important base vote.
And in order to
keep them happy, he needs to be able to provide
things for them.
What Trump is doing is saying, despite all the noise,
despite all the allegations of
corruption, despite the immoral behavior,
I'm giving you everything that you want.
So therefore, you have no choice but
to vote for me.
Andra's right.
Trump's success in securing the evangelical
vote seems both calculated and confusing.
To better understand the nuance of his supporters,
we spoke with Lisa Babbage, an evangelical
whose values are strongly guided by her faith.
And as such, she avidly supports Donald Trump.
Lisa is also running for Congress on the
Republican ticket.
What role do you think faith plays in a voter
choosing who they will vote for?
I really think it should be,
you know, the most influence possible.
Wow, okay.
I do, I do.
Now I'm not an authority on every religion.
If you are a Christ follower and you call yourself a
Christian, then your vote should
include those things that Christ prescribed
as how a government should run.
Do you feel as though your Christian values
are reflected in what you see in the Trump
administration right now?
There's a way Christians are classified,
biblically speaking.
You have your infancy stage,
you have your toddler stage,
your adolescence and so on.
I would say that, yes, we see infancy Christian
behavior coming from the White House.
And so that's where I see a lot of room for growth.
I mean, President Trump has not been a Christian
his entire life.
He's the first one to say that.
And so I miss the boat on a regular basis.
I expect him to miss it as well.
Lisa and I talked for a long time about her belief in
social justice and equality and
areas for growth within the Republican Party.
But her support for the Trump
administration was unwavering.
And it seemed to me, heavily influenced by
a common faith.
This attitude is reflected in so many right
leaning voters who are willing to overlook
Trump's most troubling behaviors because of a
perceived foundation in Christianity.
But where does that leave us in our
political process?
I mean, I think in particular for Muslims after 9/11,
there is the specter of Islamophobia.
Will voters, you know, because of the package
of a Muslim woman, will some voters be dissuaded
to vote for her, even if they agree with all the messages?
There's certainly a privilege here...
Right.
That priviledges Christian candidates.
For somebody who is not Christian,
I mean, they are in the socially more
disadvantaged position.
We're seeing more people run for office.
We're seeing more people put themselves out there.
And these folks are on the vanguard of
writing the book for how one presents themselves
as a candidate of faith in
a predominantly Christian environment.
Many of us are struggling.
Many of us are from the working class.
It doesn't matter if you're white, if you're black,
you're brown, you're gay, you're queer,
you're straight, you're trans, you're cis,
you're gender nonconforming.
It doesn't matter what economic background
you come from.
She went and fought for those migrant families
at the border.
She fought for trans people's rights here in this
state, in this conservative state.
That's the kind of bold progressive
leadershipthat we need.
Back in Nabilah's campaign headquarters,
the energy was electric.
People of all faiths, races and backgrounds
showed up to support and canvass for Nabilah
in their neighborhoods.
Democratic socialism seeks to do what the Bible
said to redistribute the wealth that
is laid up for the wicked to the just.
Democratic socialism seeks to feed the hungry,
to clothe the naked, and to care for the sick.
The politics of low is what Jesus preached
when he said
that health care was a human right, that whosoever
was seeking healing should be healed.
That's the politics of love.
I want to introduce you to Nabilah Islam.
Nabilah!
Growing up here, I never saw anyone
that looked like us at the table.
Anyone that reflected our values or diversity.
Because of conservative ideologies, our community
has been left behind.
We are tired of the same old, same old politics
that tell us to just wait a little bit longer.
Not yet.
We're tired of incrementalism.
We want change now.
Yes!
Let's take all of our love and all of our hearts.
And bring everyone into our love movement.
In many ways, Nabilah's campaign kicked into
a new gear just as our time together came
to a close.
Nabilah!
[indistinguishable] Good, good.
As she continues to earn endorsements, public support,
and recognition, I'm honestly on
pins and needles as we approach Election Day
this spring.
It's not hard to feel invested in someone so
committed to giving their district not
only the representation it deserves, but
representation they've never had before.
She was the youngest person ever in Virginia?
Yeah, ever in Virginia.
In Virginia to ever get elected.
During this tumultuous time in American politics,
Nabilah is on the frontlines of challenging
a broken system.
I've always wanted to be a public servant.
Ever since I was a little girl,
I just never thought I was electable because
my name is Nabilah Islam and I just thought
people would be not ready for that.
I think people around the country want to see
themselves in their elected officials.
The country is ready for representation.
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