(VOA) For more than 30 years, Senzel Schaefer has called the Democratic Party her political home, consistently voting for the party’s candidates in every primary, midterm and presidential election.
Come Election Day, she’ll break ranks. For Muslim American voters like Schaefer, ending the Israel-Hamas war is a top priority. Unhappy with the Biden administration’s handling of the conflict, Schaefer, an Afghan American tech executive in northern Virginia, plans to cast her ballot for a third-party candidate.
“For me as an American voter, this is probably the most difficult decision I’m making at this point in time,” she said in an interview.
Schaefer is not alone. The Gaza war, now in its 10th month, has both unified and fractured what has been a traditionally Democratic voting bloc, representing more than 3.5 million Muslim Americans.
