At a press conference with local imams and community activists, President Emran Gazi said the weekly voter registration drives were energizing people who had previously not considered voting to be important.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can guarantee you, if you all go out and vote this time, Muslims\u2019 vote will make a difference in Houston and Harris County,\u201d\u00a0Gazi said.<\/p>\n
His organization gathered Houston Muslim leaders at the River Oaks Islamic Center to condemn a new social studies curriculum that they said demonized Islam. Texas\u2019 Republican-controlled Board of Education approved the new curriculum for high schoolers in an 8-4 vote on Sept. 4 over the objections of Muslim and other religious leaders.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The new curriculum<\/a> requires students to \u201cexplain early Islam in terms of Mohammed’s, the prophet of Islam, brutal military campaigns against Jewish and Christian tribes, the normalization of slavery, and the taking of female captives as harem slaves.\u201d<\/p>\n In a news release after the state education board approved the new curriculum, the board’s chairman, Aaron Kinsey, celebrated the new standards. He cheered their “central emphasis on the foundations of Western Civilization and the values that shaped America’s and Texas’ founding.”<\/p>\n Daa’iyah Farooq, a retired Houston school counselor, worried the curriculum would teach some children to feel inferior, and others superior. “We are not asking the board to hide an uncomfortable history, but to apply the same intellectual standing to everyone,” she said.<\/p>\n State Rep. Gene Wu of Houston, who leads the Texas House Democrats, urged about 50 people gathered Wednesday to vote out the state education board members who had approved the new rules. He encouraged Asian Americans to unite to fight Republicans, and blasted Muslim donors to Republican candidates as \u201cdonating to our enemies.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Wu, who is not Muslim, declined to name the donors, but he called on Muslim community members to do so. After the conference ended, several attendees criticized S. Javaid Anwar, an oil executive who has given over $15 million to Gov. Greg Abbott\u2019s political action committee, Texans for Greg Abbott, according to campaign finance reports.\u00a0<\/p>\n The Texas Ethics Commission included in-kind contributions from Anwar, such as\u00a0airplane use and other travel expenses. Its reports show he\u2019s given the committee $1.5 million since January of this year.<\/p>\n Transparency USA, a campaign finance website, lists Anwar<\/a> as the donor who\u2019s given Abbott the most money since 2015. Anwar did not immediately respond to a phone call seeking his perspective.\u00a0<\/p>\n