After reaching a record number of females in the state Legislature, New Jersey is seeing an exodus of women leaving office. Among those departing is one of the state’s first Muslim and Asian Americans to win a seat at the State House.
Assemblywoman Sadaf Jaffer (D-Somerset) says she won’t seek reelection after serving just one term because of verbal attacks from opponents and social media users. “I think we experience certain levels of harassment and especially as minorities, as women of color, as Muslims in politics,” Jaffer said. But the level of harassment, she said, has “been tough. It’s scary. … You kind of see the worst of humanity in terms of the prejudice that people have and, you know, anyone who’s in public service, it’s a sacrifice, it’s time away from your family. It’s something that you do to serve the public and when you face that sort of targeted harassment based on your race or your religion, ethnicity, gender, it really gets to you.”
As well as facing attacks from opponents, Jaffer said she faced “all sorts of harassment from people on social media saying, you know, you shouldn’t be in this position, you’re not American, you’re an infiltrator, you’re going do all these horrible things.”
Jaffer said she is “very much dedicated to figuring out how to not only get women elected but support them once they’re in those positions … not only hiring diverse candidates but also retaining those candidates in these positions and make sure that we have as representative of a government as possible.”
