The American Muslim story is constantly evolving — and ISPU’s American Muslim Poll has been tracking it for nearly a decade. In this episode of Deep Dives, ISPU’s Director of Research and report co-author Saher Selod, PhD, joins Executive Director Tuqa Nusairat to unpack key findings from the 2025 American Muslim Poll. 

You’ll hear how Muslim voters showed up in the 2024 election, what the data reveals about civic engagement and rising Islamophobia, and how researchers, policymakers, and journalists can use these insights to build a more accurate and equitable understanding of Muslim communities in America.

ISPU’s research Access to Healthcare Among Arab and South Asian Muslims in Southeast Michigan: A Systems Approach offers a model for using a community-based systems approach to understand and address the barriers Muslim communities face in accessing care.

On this episode of Deep Dives, Madiha Tariq, Deputy County Executive of Oakland County, MI, and Megan Collado, Senior Director at AcademyHealth, explore how local, people-first solutions can transform healthcare systems. You’ll hear how Oakland County is connecting hospitals, nonprofits, and community partners to address the whole person, and how hyper-local insights can inform national policy to create lasting change.

Islamophobia doesn’t just harm Muslims–it endangers everyone. In the years since 9/11, policies driven by anti-Muslim sentiment have expanded government surveillance, empowered immigration enforcement, and undermined civil liberties across the board. 

In this episode of Deep Dives with ISPU, Tuqa Nusairat, ISPU Executive Director and Saher Selod, PhD, ISPU Director of Research unpack how Islamophobia has reshaped American institutions, and how its continued presence and recent escalation pose a fundamental threat to our democracy today. But there’s also hope: Tuqa and Saher explore how communities can organize across lines of difference and strategies they will use to push back against rising authoritarianism.

In the months leading up to the 2024 presidential election, American Muslim voters in swing states received unprecedented attention from mainstream media and policymakers. With concerns about the U.S. role in Gaza at the forefront, American Muslims significantly increased their civic engagement—mobilizing politically, forming coalitions, and shifting their support in ways that had the potential to reshape the electoral landscape.

In this episode of Deep Dives with ISPU, Imam Mika’il Stewart Saadiq (Imam, Muslim Center of Detroit), Linda Sarsour (Executive Director, Mpower Change), Dr. Yousseff Chouhoud (ISPU Scholar & Associate Professor, Christopher Newport University), and Salman Khan (PhD Candidate, Harvard University & Co-Founder, Muslim Campus Life) explore key questions: What lessons can be drawn from both coalition-building and the fragmentation of the Muslim vote? How can Muslims and other minority communities prepare for an incoming Trump administration? And can the student protest movement help mobilize a new generation of Muslim voters?

According to demographic data from ISPU’s American Muslim Poll, 9% of Muslims in the United States are Latino, a steadily growing percentage. In previous research, ISPU found that Latinos have lower levels of Islamophobia than other racial and ethnic groups in the United States and the general public. These demographic trends, coupled with the lower levels of Islamophobia found among this population, motivated ISPU to conduct research to uncover the "whys" of these findings. The result, Latino Attitudes Toward American Muslims and Islam, was published in October 23 in partnership with IslamInSpanish.  

In this episode, former ISPU Director of Research, Dalia Mogahed, interviews Jaime "Mujahid" Fletcher, CEO and Co-founder of IslamInSpanish, about the report findings and what we can glean from the report's dynamic focus groups.

This episode of Deep Dives with ISPU is sponsored by Talem Consulting. Embark on a transformative journey with Talem Consulting through their intersectional and equity-based framework. Talem's mission is to build capacity, fundraise, and dismantle systems of inequity in the nonprofit sphere. Since 2011, Talem has empowered nonprofits with personalized solutions through organizational management, interim leadership, fundraising expertise, leadership coaching, workshops, and speaking engagements. Discover how you can elevate your nonprofit to new heights and create a legacy of positive change by visiting www.TalemConsulting.com.

Additional Resources:

• LANDING PAGE: Latino Attitudes Toward American Muslims and Islam
• REPORT: Latino Attitudes Toward American Muslims and Islam
• REPORT: Actitudes de los latinos hacia los musulmanes estadounidenses y el Islam
• IslamInSpanish
• Deep Dives with ISPU (2022 episode): Latino Muslims: A swiftly growing and adapting community (ENGLISH)
• Deep Dives with ISPU (2022 episode): Musulmanes latinos: una comunidad en rápido crecimiento y adaptación (ESPAÑOL)

In today’s episode of Deep Dives with ISPU,  Executive Director, Meira Neggaz, sits down with SpearIt, former ISPU Scholar and current professor of law at the University of Pittsburgh, to discuss a unique aspect of American Muslim life: Muslims in the U.S. prison system.

Released in August of 2023, SpearIt’s new book, Muslim Prisoner Litigation: An Unsung American Tradition, explores how incarcerated Muslims have historically and currently used legal action to exercise their rights to religious freedom and improve the conditions of their incarceration. Meira and SpearIt discuss the intricacies of prisoner litigation, as well as the demographics of Muslims in prison, how Muslims in prison have contributed to culture and social progress, and much more.

Note:  Early in this episode, the number '1 million' is used to reference the number of adult American Muslims in the United States. The correct statistic is there are an estimated 2.15 million Muslim adults in the United States. In ISPU's research, when referencing the number of Muslims in the United States, we reference a 2017 demographic portrait from Pew Research Center. This portrait cites that there are an estimated 3.45 million Muslims in the United States, including 2.15 million Muslim adults. The link to the Pew survey can be found in the show notes of this episode. The link to this Pew survey can be found here:  https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2017/07/26/demographic-portrait-of-muslim-americans/

Resources related to this episode:

• Get SpearIt's book, Muslim Prisoner Litigation: An Unsung American Tradition
  • University of California Press
  • Amazon
• Learn more about SpearIt: https://www.law.pitt.edu/people/SpearIt
• Pew Research Center: Demographic portrait of Muslim Americans (2017)

Native Americans are often invisible in our public discussion of America, and even more so in any discussion of Muslims in the United States. There is an absence of awareness and lack of representation of Native American and Indigenous Muslims both in the broader US public and within the US Muslim community. Native American and Indigenous Muslim Stories: Reclaiming the Narrative project (NAIMS), the first comprehensive study of its kind, is centered around spreading awareness of the lived experiences of Native American and Indigenous Muslims in the United States.

On this episode of Deep Dives with ISPU, ISPU Director of Communications, Katherine Coplen, sits down with NAIMS Principal Investigator, Brennan McDaniel, to discuss the findings of the two-part NAIMS report. Brennan and Katherine last spoke in February 2022 on Deep Dives with ISPU to give a preview of what this research could look like. A year and a half later, this episode is part two of that conversation, and we're thrilled to have them back to discuss the findings now that the report is complete.

Brennan is a PhD student in the American Studies department at Yale University. He received an MA from Columbia University in 2019 and a BA from Vassar College in 2017. Brennan’s work is nested primarily between Islamic Studies and Native American/Indigenous Studies, and his research interests revolve around histories of ideas, emotions, and political economies among Muslim communities and tribal nations in North America.

NAIMS: Visions and Voices is the first-ever photo narrative project to center the lived experiences of Native American and Indigenous Muslims in the United States. ISPU researchers conducted 17 in-depth, semi-structured interviews with Native American Muslims over a period of six months. Interviews explored identity, ways to navigate multiple marginalized communities, and insights into participants' struggles, hopes, and dreams.

NAIMS: Trends and Treasures is a thematic report of the strengths and struggles of Native American and Indigenous Muslims. It draws on the narratives of participants in the Visions and Voices portion, as well as on a series of focus groups with Native American and Indigenous people of other faiths and no faith.

For more content like this, follow ISPU on Twitter and Facebook @theISPU, on Instagram @the_ISPU, and visit our website to access a vast repository of research. Subscribe to Deep Dives with ISPU wherever podcasts are found, and leave us a 5-star review to ensure we can produce more conversations like this one.

In recent years, Muslim individuals, businesses, and nonprofits have reported facing potentially discriminatory practices at some of the nation’s largest banks. As part of our American Muslim Poll 2022, we published an analysis on the experiences of Banking While Muslim. In this episode of Deep Dives with ISPU, ISPU Executive Director Meira Neggaz interviews Banking While Muslim author Dr. Youssef Chouhoud and Chris Blauvelt, CEO and founder of LaunchGood, to discuss these experiences and findings.

Youssef Chouhoud is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Christopher Newport University, where he is affiliated with the Reiff Center for Human Rights and Conflict Resolution. Prior to joining CNU, Dr. Chouhoud was a Provost’s Fellow at the University of Southern California, where he received his Ph.D. Youssef’s work has been published in the journal Politics and Religion, the Oxford Handbook of Polling and Survey Methods, and, most recently, the British Journal of Political Science.

Chris Blauvelt is a passionate Muslim American entrepreneur committed to building up the global Muslim community to reach its full potential. Chris is the CEO & founder of LaunchGood.com, the world's largest faith-inspired crowdfunding platform and in 10 years LaunchGood has raised over $370 million across 153 countries from 1+ million donors. LaunchGood has captured global attention through its bridge-building crowdfunding campaigns that spurred Muslims to rebuild Black churches, repair desecrated Jewish cemeteries, and support families of the New Zealand mosque attacks.

Resources related to this episode:

• Full analysis: Banking While Muslim
• American Muslim Poll 2022
• LaunchGood

In this episode of Deep Dives with ISPU, ISPU Executive Director Meira Neggaz, in conversation with Imam Saffet Catovic, a long-time US Muslim community organizer/activist and environmental leader, discuss the hotly debated topic of climate change. Opinions about causes of and solutions to climate change were one of several hot button topics covered in our American Muslim Poll 2022, and this conversation sought to expand upon these findings, as well as dig into how faith communities and leaders may choose to think about and approach solutions to climate change.

Additional resources related to this topics:

• ISPU Climate Change analysis
• ISPU American Muslim Poll 2022

Fielded between mid-February and mid-March, American Muslim Poll 2022: A Politics and Pandemic Status Report provides a snapshot of American Muslims and Americans of other faiths as well as no faith two years into the COVID-19 pandemic as we enter a new phase of living with the virus. In its sixth installment, this poll presents an updated demographic profile of American Muslims, measured the Islamophobia Index, and expands on areas of study of institutional and individual Islamophobia and bullying to cover not only “brick and mortar” engagements but online spaces.

On this episode of Deep Dives with ISPU, Director of Communications, Katherine Coplen, interviews Dalia Mogahed, ISPU's Director of Research and the poll's co-author, on the poll's research processes and findings.

Related resources to this episode:

• American Muslim Poll 2022