The Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations says it received three death threats on three consecutive days this month, and the organization has turned the matter over to Canton Township police, where its office is based. CAIR-MI says the threats arrived alongside a broader wave of anti-Muslim rhetoric spreading online in Metro Detroit.
According to The Detroit News, CAIR-MI reported the threats to Canton Township police, which is now investigating. The group’s office regularly fields harassing emails and social media messages, but the recent run of consecutive death threats marks an escalation that prompted the formal police report. CAIR-MI attorney Amy Doukoure said political disagreements and public debate must never be used to justify threats of violence against Muslims, Muslim institutions, or those who defend the rights of American Muslims.
Doukoure also said death threats directed at a civil rights organization are an unacceptable, and inevitable, result of manufactured anti-Muslim hate, according to the same report. CAIR-MI has urged law enforcement authorities to investigate credible threats and called on public officials and community leaders to condemn efforts to intimidate Muslim Americans and their advocates. The organization has also called for an end to anti-Muslim hate speech more broadly.
A Primary Win and a Provocateur’s Return
CAIR-MI has pointed to two recent developments as flashpoints behind the surge in hostility. Abdul El-Sayed won Michigan’s Democratic U.S. Senate primary on August 4, defeating U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens to advance to the November general election against Republican Mike Rogers, according to PBS NewsHour…