The news of the qualified endorsement of the Democratic Presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry by the American Muslim Taskforce on Civil Rights and Elections (AMT), a coalition of the ten national Muslim organizations, was carried internationally, notably in the Muslim and Arab world. 

Leaders of major American Muslim organizations contend that elections provide opportunities for agenda setting, coalition building, skills-formation, and negotiated accommodation of minority interests. Muslims have made progress in each area, though not at the same level of success. 

According to one post election survey, 21 per cent of the Muslims voting in the Election 2004 were first-time voters. This is consistent with the data collected by University of Maryland Researcher James Gimpel and others. 

The highest-ever Muslim vote, pivoted around AMT's efforts, resulted from a relentless yearlong drive to mobilize the community through town hall meetings, conventions, and voter education workshops across the 50 states. 

The efficacy of these town hall meetings prompted the New York State-based Observer-Dispatch on April 17 to comment editorially: "No-shows at the ballot box might take a lesson from Muslim-Americans, who are stepping up efforts to assume an active role in the nation's political process." 

This year, the American Muslims used the electoral process to reorganize themselves along democratic lines by building a bottom-up, multi-institutional, decision-making mechanism. 

A Zogby poll commissioned by the Georgetown University and released on October 19, 2004, indicated that 81 per cent American Muslims supported AMT Election Plan including its "Civil Rights Plus Agenda" which emphasizes civil and human rights for all, domestic issues of public good and general welfare, global peace with justice, prevention of war, and U.S. relations with the Muslim world.

Twenty-five percent of those responding to the Zogby poll said they had been profiled, 40 per cent said they had personally experienced discrimination, and 57 percent said they knew someone who had been discriminated against. Yet, 90 percent favored remaining politically involved. 

The strongest support for Muslim political unity and the AMT came from African-American, African and Arab Muslims," the poll documented. 

This strong support from African American Muslims for AMT is, in part, a result of healing and bridge building by both indigenous as well as immigrant Muslim organizations. In 2000 these groups were unable to fashion a common approach to elections. 

The rectification was achieved by a number of steps: recognizing mistakes of the past, instituting confidence building measures, setting up a democratic decision-making process, and enabling the grassroots to partake in the decision-making process. 

Today, indigenous Muslims lead three organizations within the AMT. Moreover, most organizations include indigenous and immigrant Muslims in leadership positions. 

In his book Silent No More, former Congressman Paul Findley recorded 72 percent Muslims vote for George W. Bush. According to a number of post election surveys, 93 per cent of Muslims voted as a bloc in 2004. 

The data below for all groups except Muslims is taken from the National Election Pool created by six major news organizations. The Muslim data was collected by the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the American Muslim Alliance (AMA) in two separate community surveys. 

Muslim Vote 93%
Black Vote 89% 
Evangelical Vote 78% 
Jewish Vote 78% 
Veterans Vote 57% 
Hispanic Vote 55%
Catholic Vote 52% 

The Zogby poll conducted several weeks before the elections had recorded that 76 percent of Muslims intended to vote for Sen. John Kerry. The AMT endorsement persuaded most Muslims who were undecided or Nader supporters to join the bloc vote. 

By and large the election results show that the American Muslim community has made some fundamental choices: it has rejected the view of passive citizenship in favor of a vibrant and dynamic role; it has declined to support a third party presidential candidate, yet it has embraced important questions raised by the third parties. 

A recent survey of community leaders, intellectual, thinkers and writers, shows three new trends: 1) new-found commitment to health care, education, inner city development and affordable housing; 2) greater understanding and appreciation of the role civic organizations, such as ACLU and NAACP, and coalition-building; and 3) adoption of a multiparty strategy, which stipulates support for candidates and issues instead of parties. 

Many Green, Libertarian, Independent and Reform party candidates were endorsed and supported at the city and state levels.