Excerpt:
The moment when Donald Trump, then a presidential candidate, claimed at a rally that he saw “thousands and thousands” of people in Jersey City cheering during the 9/11 attacks is seared into Mussab Ali’s memory.
Here was a man aspiring for the nation’s highest office, lying about his community and putting them at risk. Those anti-Muslim comments, and others that followed, drove the Rutgers University student to turn to politics.
On Tuesday, Ali was re-elected to the Jersey City Board of Education, one of more than 20 Muslim-American candidates who ran in elections across New Jersey. In all, 11 won seats or were re-elected as school board members, mayors, councilmen and freeholders.