Mayor invites Trump to Hamtramck

Mayor Amer Ghalib poses with Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump before Trump spoke at a Flint rally. Photo from Facebook

By Charles Sercombe
Brace yourself Hamtramck: the 2024 presidential election may be coming to town.
Mayor Amer Ghalib said he met privately with Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump in Flint on Tuesday, where there was a Trump rally, and he invited Trump to come to Hamtramck.
“It’s possible,” Ghalib said on his Facebook page. “We will hear from them soon. … We opened a channel of communication with the former president, and it will continue. We thought about the possibility of breaking the wall between the Republican Party and minorities.”
Ghalib said Trump asked for his endorsement, which Ghalib said he replied: “I’m here to discuss that matter. That’s why I’m here. And so we agreed there would be further discussion and a possibility of opening an office in Hamtramck. Trump 47.”
The 47 reference means that if elected, Trump would be the 47th president of the country.
Previous to Ghalib’s summary of his meeting with Trump, he wrote on his Facebook page about the meeting:
“It’s a new era!
“Today, I had a closed meeting with President Trump for 20 minutes, before the town hall in Flint.
“We discussed many topics. I’ll discuss the details later. …”
Trump has been courting Muslims for their support, especially in Michigan where that voting bloc could make the difference in who wins in Michigan.
Ghalib’s invitation to Trump may seem odd to some considering that Ghalib is a Muslim, and that Trump’s previous treatment of Muslims while he was president received backlash.
Trump instituted a ban on people from Muslim majority countries entering the U.S.
Trump is also associating with others who have spoken out against Muslims, such as hard-right conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer, a self-proclaimed Islamophobe, and Stephen Miller, who was a senior advisor to Trump during his presidency and the architect of the Muslim travel ban.
Ghalib is an immigrant from Yemen, a country that was included in the Trump travel ban.
The response to Ghalib’s Facebook post is, as expected, mixed.
“That is a great first step. As the saying goes, a thousand mile journey begins with a single step,” said Nagi Almudhegi.
In that same vein, Yasser Abu Ammar saw this meeting as a “good move” that could signal a change in Trump’s opinion on Muslims.
“We wish Trump would leave the hate speech against Muslims
after this meeting,” he added.
Others were not pleased.
“The biggest and worst damages. Forgot the deal of the century and move the capital to Jerusalem? Or have you forgotten his offensive statements to Islam, the Holy Quran and to immigrants?” said Musaed Yahya Althaibani.
On the social media site Reddit, one anonymous person questioned why Ghalib would associate with Trump and hint of his support for him:
“He does understand that Trump would deport most of the population of Hamtramck? The mental gymnastics people do.”
Ghalib was among many Muslims in the metro area critical of the Biden administration’s support of military aid to Israel, its invasion of Gaza, and the resulting deaths of about 40,000 Palestinians.
He did not support President Biden in the Democratic presidential primary, and so far he has not shown support for Vice President Harris since she took over as the Democratic presidential nominee after Biden dropped out.
Posted Sept. 20, 2027