President-elect Donald Trump has a complicated track record when it comes to Kurdistan. During his first term in office, he declined to support Iraqi Kurdistan’s 2017 independence referendum and passed a “Muslim travel ban” that impacted many Kurdish people until it was overturned by the courts. Two years later, he withdrew American troops from Syria, where they had been supporting Kurdish forces fighting against ISIS.
These actions sparked protests from Nashville’s Kurdish community — the largest in the United States — including from Trump supporters.
Nazar Sharanshi, an active volunteer with the Republican Party of Tennessee and a member of the Kurdish Republican Party of Nashville, was one of them. He called the U.S. withdrawal from Syria a “betrayal” of a group that had been a key military ally.
“A lot of Kurdish people, you know, in the beginning, were in support of Trump and voted for Trump,” Sharanshi said at a protest in 2019. “Now, a lot of them, they got angry because of what Trump did and what he said.”
During the 2024 election, Sharanshi worked hard to get conservative candidates elected up and down the ballot. He voted for Trump because he believes he will improve the economy and crack down on border security. However, he added that for many in Nashville’s Kurdish community, support for the Republican Party is rooted in history.
More: Timeline — the shared history of Nashville and Kurdistan
Sharanshi himself first became involved in U.S. politics more than 20 years ago through George W. Bush’s first presidential campaign. He knew that Bush’s father, George H. W. Bush, had been instrumental in creating a no-fly zone to protect Kurds in northern Iraq from Saddam Hussein, and hoped this Bush would do even more.
And he did. The controversial invasion of Iraq in 2003 deposed Saddam Hussein, who had brutally persecuted the Kurds for years. It also allowed for the creation of an autonomous Kurdish regional government in northern Iraq.
“He kicked Saddam Hussein out, built a federal government for Kurdish people and stabilized Kurdistan,” said Sharanshi.
He added that these two presidencies did a lot to give the GOP a good reputation with the Kurdish diaspora.
“The Republican Party has always been close to our people in Kurdistan. They did some damage. But you see, they do more good than damage.”
Sharanshi said that despite past disappointments, he hopes that the Trump administration will be a strong ally for Kurdistan. He also encouraged everyone, regardless of party, to vote and become civically engaged.
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