Noor Alfayyadh (born 2000) was a Palestinian-American political activist who served as a member of the Michigan House of Representatives from 10 April 2023 to 14 January 2030 and as Governor of Michigan from 14 January 2030 (succeeding Karen Weiling). Alfayyadh made history as the first Muslim governor of any US state, as well as the first open Islamist elected to a statewide office across the USA.
Biography[]
Noor Alfayyadh was born in Ramallah, Palestine in 2000, the daughter of surgeon Khaled Alfayyadh and nurse Karima Alfayyadh. Noor and her parents emigrated to the United States amid the Second Intifada, during which her cousin Yusuf and uncle Hamid were killed by the IDF. Alfayyadh was raised in Dearborn, Michigan, where she became deeply engaged with the local Muslim community. In college, she became president of her school's Muslim Students Association, and she befriended classmate Nabiha Khoury. Upset with the Democratic Party's support for Israel and its socially liberal policies, Alfayyadh embarked on a project to found a grassroots political party with the purpose of giving Muslims a legislative voice outside of the Democratic Party. She and Khoury cofounded the Dawah Party, and, with the support of community activists, they won election to the Michigan House of Representatives in 2023, breaking the two-party stranglehold on Michigan politics.
Over the next seven years, Alfayyadh and Khoury built the Dawah Party into a powerful third party bringing together Michigan's growing Arab and Muslim communities with young progressives, anti-Zionists, and socially conservative minority voters disenchanted with both the liberal Democratic Party and the anti-immigrant Republican Party. In 2030, her party won 27.06% of the vote and became the second-largest party in the state legislature, overwhelming the Democratic Party. As the Trumpist governor Karen Weiling had changed the election system so that governors were elected by the state legislature (which was overwhelmingly Republican during her tenure) rather than by the people, the Dawah Party's electoral breakthrough - which deprived the Republicans of their majority - ensured that the parties' options would be limited to voting for Weiling or voting for Alfayyadh. While Alfayyadh had spent much of her early time in office attacking the Democratic Party with the goal of destroying it and replacing it as the GOP's main opposition, she soon accepted reality and contented herself with utilizing the Democratic Party's weakness to force them into backing her against an increasingly authoritarian Republican Party. The Democrats endorsed Alfayyadh, who won the support of 24 state representatives to Weiling's 22, allowing her to oust the GOP from power and bring the Dawah Party into power despite its lack of a majority or even a plurality in the state legislature.