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During a town hall at George Mason University in Northern Virginia last fall, Sanders hugged an American Muslim student after she asked him a personal and an emotional question: How would he address the issue of racism and discrimination against minorities as president?
Those moments captured the anxiety and pain Remaz Abdelgader has felt in an election year marked by rhetoric about Islam.
To her, Sanders sounded authentic rather than being consoling merely for the sake of a sound bite. "It has been tremendous to just hear that kind of support," she said.
"I'm a black, I'm a Muslim and I'm a woman. To be those three identities is very dangerous because everyday you are facing new battles," the George Mason senior said.
In high school, she related, a man called her an "Iraqi bitch" while nearly running her over. Abdelgader, who immigrated from Sudan when she was 6 years old, managed to escape any serious physical injury but long remained scathed by her memories of the event.
After hearing Sanders answer her question, she began to campaign for the Vermont senator, saying he had given her a renewed sense of hope and promise in America. "I don't really know home other than America," said Abdelgader, who aspires to be a human rights lawyer.
Her involvement in the campaign provided her a rare chance to interact with people of diverse communities at the campaign's watch parties. For the first time, she started working closely with Jews and other groups.
The exchange between Sanders -- who responded to her question by noting that he is Jewish and his father's family died in Nazi concentration camps -- and Abdelgader went viral with more than 130,000 views. She believes the exchange also underlines symbolic unity of Muslims and Jews and the need to build bridges to eradicate racism. Sanders, she said, "is the epitome of what society needs to be. It does not matter if you are a Christian. It does not matter if you are Jewish, white, black, poor, rich. It's unity. We need that unity. We have moved from the word 'race.'"
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