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AAI in the News

Stakes high for Arab Americans in Iowa

By Steve Gravelle
Cedar Rapids Gazette
Posted on Tuesday August 14, 2007

CEDAR RAPIDS – The events of the past six years have raised the stakes for Arab American Iowans looking to 2008.

“There is more at stake when it comes to Arab Americans and the Palestinian-Israeli situation, and now added to it Iraq,” said Carl David.

David, 69, of Cedar Rapids, and about 50 other local residents spent Sunday afternoon brushing up their political skills. The first off a series of “political empowerment workshops” sponsored by the Washington, D.C.-based Arab American Institute, the session at the Clarion Hotel and Conference Center included advice on talking to politicians and candidates.

Linn County leaders from both major political parties spoke to the group. Democratic candidates John Edwards and Barack Obama were the only presidential hopefuls to take up the AAI’s invitation to send a representative.

”This is kind of the introduction to the caucuses,” said Emily Holley, the AAI’s Iowa organizer. “The purpose off this is to have people in the Arab American community be aware of us, and to get involved.”

The institute will hold workshops this year to prepare new participants for the caucuses, said Holley, whose office is in Cedar Rapids.

Getting involved in Iowa politics helps AAI’s national effort, said Valerie Smith, the AAI’s national director of community relations.

”You guys are important in making the national office have a higher profile, because Iowa is first and the media is here,” Smith said.

The AAI will hold similar sessions this week in Cedar Falls and Des Moines. The Cedar Rapids area has the state’s highest concentration of Arab Americans. Smith, a Cedar Rapids native, said the local community has always been politically involved.

“When you have folks who have been here for 100 years, they’re plugged in,” she said.

David said he was involve in Democratic politics in the 1970s and ‘80s through his labor union, but has sat out the last few election cycles.

“I’ve just more or less retired and decided to do something,” he said. “I don’t feel there’s any way America can stand back and not be involved in the world.”

David is looking for a presidential candidate to push for regional peace talks – “some concrete effort to promote peace in the Middle East.”