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DEARBORN, Michigan – Michigan is home to one of the largest concentrations of Arab Americans and others from the Middle East and North Africa. But because of the way the government collects data, it’s hard to know precisely how many other people this includes. and how it is more productive to allocate the budget to those communities.
In February of this year, Michigan lawmakers proposed two bills that would allow the state to add a designation for other people of Middle Eastern or North African (MENA) descent by collecting demographic data, a tool that proponents say would lead to better fitness and education and other network resources across the state.
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Democratic state Rep. Alabas Farhat, who co-sponsored the bills, told NewsHour that the intent of the bills’ sponsors is for the Arab and American communities in the MENA region to be considered. When their whereabouts are not taken into account, knowledge can make a user and a network absolutely invisible,” Farhat said.
“And when it’s invisible to knowledge, it’s also invisible to policymakers who rely on that knowledge to make decisions,” he added.
Community advocates have long called for the U. S. Census to be replaced. U. S. Census and other federal documents, which have classified most MENA citizens as white since the early 20th century. The U. S. Office of Management and BudgetThe U. S. Department of Homeland Security (OMB) has just announced a revision of federal criteria for how data on race and ethnicity will be collected, adding a new category for the Middle East or North Africa. Hispanics or Latinos are another new category. Federal agencies have until March 2029 to align their data with the new categories before the 2030 census.
Typically, once federal criteria are established, states and localities slowly adapt. On this issue, cities and states have led the way. The state of Illinois has already passed a law to collect knowledge about Americans in the MENA region starting July 1. , 2025. California is considering a similar bill. If passed this legislative session, Michigan’s spending would require the state to begin collecting racial or ethnic data on people of Middle Eastern or North African descent with a MENA classification through the end of 2024.
In addition to state-level proposals, some Michigan jurisdictions have already begun collecting this data. The City of Dearborn collected MENA data starting in 2023 as part of its first-ever network fitness assessment, with a particular focus on the Arab-American network. Previously, in the midst of the pandemic, Wayne County began providing a MENA category at vaccination sites based on local COVID knowledge.
Michigan’s statewide proposal features the most recent decision from the federal government. The two bills, Bills 5447 and 5448, are recently in committee.
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Some would possibly point to the federal government’s action and wonder why Michigan or other states want to act on their own.
“Even if we had the knowledge collected at the federal level, it would be years before we can get it, simply because it takes a long time. And we need that knowledge as soon as possible,” said Sara A. Ismail, a civil servant. Policy Associate at the National Network of Arab American Communities (NNAAC), at a March event in Dearborn focused on knowledge disaggregation efforts.
The announcement of a MENA category for federal knowledge gathering only serves to bolster Michigan’s proposals, proponents say.
“There are huge advantages for us as a state in spending our budget smarter and designing our policy to reflect the diversity of our state,” Farhat said.
The federal criteria for collecting knowledge about race and ethnicity query how federal agencies collect knowledge, such as the U. S. Census. U. S. Census Bureau, Family Surveys, and Application Forms for Advantages. They were first developed in 1977 as a reaction to compliance with civil rights legislation and all that. Federal agencies collect and provide consistent knowledge about race and ethnicity. These criteria were revised in 1997.
Most people in the MENA region have been racially categorized by the government as white since the early 1900s, but belonging to this category is not compatible with their current experience and identity, and the Arab and American communities in the MENA region have struggled. to knowingly reveal the demanding situations and inequities they face without more nuanced categories that take into account their race and ethnicity.
The WBO revision announced last week, the first in just three decades, creates a new racial category for other people in the MENA region. It also creates a combined factor of race and ethnicity, eliminating what critics have called a confusing division of two groups. step-by-step procedure that was out of sync with the way many other people identify. People filling the federal bureaucracy will soon have the ability to select ethnic characteristics in this category, an update that advocates say will allow for a more disaggregated view of the Hispanic community/Latino and U. S. population in the MENA region, among others.
Prior to this shift, U. S. communities in the U. S. MENA region “struggled to quantify the inequities they face in their lives, from education to small businesses, health care and studies to language access,” Ismail said.
“Nationally, the estimate is 3. 5 million to 5. 1 million,” said Germine Awad, a psychology professor at the University of Michigan who has worked extensively on identity issues in Arab and American communities in the MENA region. number]. That’s the goal. “
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Since the federal government has not collected this knowledge before, it has been left to community organizations to estimate the population of Arab Americans and others in the MENA region. Each organization does this differently, and therefore estimates can vary considerably, depending on the objective of the survey, the techniques used, and the countries of origin or ethnic teams included.
The 2020 U. S. Census introduced for the first time the ability to write in a country of origin by racial category. About 3. 5 million people in the white racial category wrote in a MENA country, either alone or in combination with some other group. Lebanon, Iran, and Egypt were the three largest known countries of origin in the MENA region. In previous years, if other people were writing in a MENA country, their responses would have been recorded blank.
According to the 2020 census, just over 310,000 people living in Michigan reported their origins in the MENA region in this written category.
But the 2020 census figures constitute a “seriously undercount” due to the nature of the written responses, Awad said. “It’s like a snapshot of who’s motivated enough to write it,” Awad added.
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Being undervalued, especially in a minority community, only exacerbates inequities in representation and resource allocation. In much of Awad’s research, she examines reports of discrimination and prejudice by Arabs and Americans in the MENA region. One of their studies collected identity data with an additional MENA checkbox and showed that if there is a MENA checkbox, other people will check it. This study convinced the Census Bureau to mark a MENA category when conducting the much larger 2015 National Content Test.
She said her paintings have helped what Netpaintings has been saying for a long time: “Hey, we’re not a white Netpaintings. “
“The challenge is that we know there are disparities, but we don’t have evidence of those disparities,” Awad said.
For example, Arab Americans are more predisposed to high blood pressure, diabetes and certain cancers, Farhat said. However, because Arab Americans are classified as white, it is more complicated to track them down and offer them more targeted physical care.
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During the COVID-19 pandemic, many small businesses across the country have struggled to stay in business. Some loans have been introduced to help minority-owned businesses. However, because Arab Americans and Americans of Middle Eastern and North African descent are classified according to the classification by the federal government, as white, Arab, and American small business owners in the MENA region have not been able to access express loans for minority-owned businesses.
“Other small business owners have had to keep their businesses afloat, while many homeowners in the MENA region have had to close their doors,” Ismail said.
The lack of nuance also affects academia, as it’s harder to keep track of school admissions, campus enrollment rates, and graduate completion rates because knowledge is being collected.
During the pandemic, Illinois Arab American Family Services, a member of the National Arab American Communities Network (NNAAC), advocated for the state of Illinois to track vaccination in U. S. communities in the MENA region through the use of a MENA category.
“They were hoping that the knowledge of the state would show the good fortune of the paintings they had made to teach and vaccinate their communities,” Ismail said. “However, they soon learned that just as knowledge can tie programs together, it can also create barriers. “
Because federal data classifies Americans in the MENA region as white, the data had to be grouped into the broader white category when it was submitted to the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services. The U. S. Department of Public Affairs (DHHS), and the Illinois Department of Public Affairs cadres lost health for MENA communities.
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This also happens on a smaller scale. Awad says schools realize they have a giant population of a specific organization. “So, they can just gather more knowledge at the school level, for example, or at the district level,” Awad explained. “However, for the purposes of informing the federal government, they then organize them under white. “
“When we don’t distinguish MENA from white people, we don’t just hurt other people in MENA. It hurts all ethnic minority organizations, because what happens is that an organization has a non-white experience in the white category,” Awad added. “It masks the disparities not only for Arabs [and] other people in the MENA region, but also for all communities of color and communities that have faced disparities. “
“We were begging other people to break down the knowledge,” Awad said. “We kept running into barriers or other people [saying] that we didn’t have the coders and that the program we used didn’t allow us to disaggregate knowledge. And because many entities use minimum reporting standards, they don’t even capture knowledge to break it down.
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The more detailed ethnic knowledge that will now be collected by the federal government will also allow networked organizations to better serve their communities in every way.
“Our communities are vibrant, not monolithic,” Ismail said. When we look at the MENA community, it is vast and diverse. They all share common cultural traditions and languages. However, the disparities faced by Moroccans are not the same for Palestinians. All communities deserve disaggregated knowledge about their respective communities.
While the federal government will begin collecting this demographic data, Michigan’s two expenditures will see the state collect its own data years before the date the data returns from the federal government, likely until the end of 2024, if approved.
These expenses will also cover the state’s interest in collecting this demographic data in the event that federal rules are replaced in the future.
“If we cross the finish line with those expenditures this year, no matter what happens at the federal level, we won’t have to worry about a replacement in leadership,” Michigan state Sen. Darrin Camilleri said at the data disaggregation event. “A federal effort could just replace the directive, replace the rule. But if we have a state law, the state of Michigan will still have to categorize our communities.
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Farhat said that “when we don’t track this data, we create scenarios where public fitness outcomes can be inversely affected,” adding issues such as infant mortality, high blood pressure rates, physical attention issues, cultural sensitivities, diet and physical literacy. , and business opportunities. . . « Therefore, the state will have to act. We can do anything about it.
Awad said having knowledge will help communities demonstrate that disparities exist and ensure investment for interventions and resources at all levels.
“It’s widespread. It is in hospitals that have language support. It is in schools that now get budget to help underrepresented academics that Arab scholars are now included. There are many other sectors where this network is invisible and underserved. We will do it now we have the knowledge to be able to advocate for more resources, and the allocation of resources will be more equitable,” Awad said.
“When we confront the disparities that come with [American] Arabs, we are helping to confront the disparities of all communities, almost all marginalized communities and communities of color,” he added.
Frances Kai-Hwa Wang is a correspondent for PBS NewsHour in Detroit and Dearborn, Michigan.
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