I sat down with Wael Al Zayat, the CEO of Emgage, an organization working to empower Muslim Americans through civic engagement. We talk about what it means to lead a national organization in this moment—one in which Muslim Americans are becoming more politically active, but also more targeted, as we saw during the mayoral race in New York City recently.

Wael walks us through the trends he’s seeing within the community, how attitudes are shifting and what issues are driving people to the polls. We also talked about Emgage’s experiences engaging with the Biden administration and the Trump and Harris campaigns last year, and about anti Muslim hate and whether it is being normalized. I also asked Wael about allyship across communities: what we can all do as people who care about human rights, equality, and international law to affect a political system that seems to work for the privileged few.

Episode notes:

Emgage USA: https://emgageusa.org/

What Zohran Mamdani's Victory Tells Us About America, Wael Al Zayat https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/zohran-mamdani-victory-america

Muslim Americans Share Political Attitudes With Both THe Democrat And Republican Parties: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/07/21/muslim-americans-share-political-attitudes-with-both-the-democratic-and-republican-parties/