A resolution honoring Muslim Americans passed the California State Assembly on Monday, but not without generating hateful comments to the author.
“I put on my Facebook page that I was doing this resolution,” said Assemblyman Bill Quirk, a Democrat from Hayward. “I got comments calling me a traitor. I got comments saying that I was working with terrorists.”
The resolution simply recognizes August as Muslim Appreciation and Awareness Month.
But the controversy is part of a larger fight in the country over the roles that Muslim Americans play in the military -- a fight in which Donald Trump has taken center stage.
Trump commented about a Gold Star family, the Khans, Muslim Americans whose Army captain son was killed fighting with the U.S. military overseas.
The father spoke to a national audience at the Democratic National Convention, but Trump later said, “If you look at his wife, she was standing there. She had nothing to say. She probably, maybe she wasn’t allowed to have anything to say, you tell me.”
But Trump supporters insist he meant no disrespect to the Gold Star family.
“I have met Mr. Trump,” said Cathy Clark, a former captain in the U.S. Air Force and a strong supporter of the Republican nominee. “I know personally that he respects and honors veterans.”
But Zahra Billoo of the Council on American Islamic Relations disagrees.
“Every time we think Donald Trump can’t get worse, he continues to surprise us,” Billoo said.
But Trump supporters like Doug Ose, who attended the Republican convention last month in Cleveland, insist that Trump is supportive of Gold Star families, regardless of religion.
“My uncle didn’t come home from World War II. My grandmother was a Gold Star mother. My heart goes out to the Khans and I think that in the heat of political battle things get said that probably shouldn’t be said,” Ose said.
At VFW Post 4647 Monday in Antelope, most veterans chose to avoid any talk of presidential politics.
“I feel that Gold Star families can say whatever they want because that is the ultimate sacrifice,” Thurman Wallace, a 41-year military vet, told KCRA 3.