After Christianity and Judaism, Islam is the third most popular religion in the United States. In 2017, there were 2.45 million Muslims in the United States, accounting for 0.78 percent of the overall population. Support for discrimination against Muslims is an obvious contradiction in a society that proclaims religious freedom as a basic principle. If the religious minority is considered as a racial group, however, their persecution is consistent with a long history of prejudice against Black Americans, Native Americans, and other racial minorities. 

Anti-Muslim activities are propagating Islamophobic discrimination in the United States. The significance of race in restricting religious minorities' civil freedoms is frequently overlooked in the USA. Furthermore, by authorizing enormous surveillance, expulsion, and prosecution of Muslim communities, politicians have legitimized the media's vilification of Muslims. Both Republican and Democratic administrations have sent the same message to the American people: Muslims are a domestic security threat. Whether it was the Bush administration's special registration through the National Security Entry-Exit System (NSEERS) or the Obama administration's Countering Violent Extremism program.

Since September 11, 2001, Muslims have been inextricably linked to terrorism in the American popular perception. The Patriot Act, the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts, violent extremist organizations, and the Muslim ban have all been featured in news reports, all of which perpetuate a link between Muslims and terrorism. "I believe Islam hates us", said former President Trump. Political figures' explicit Islamophobic remarks have lent credence to these portrayals. Former Congressman Steve King has questioned the loyalty of elected Muslim-American Congressman Keith Ellison. Anti-Muslim sentiment has been on the rise in the United States. Hate crimes targeting people who seemed to be Middle Eastern spiked immediately after the attacks.

Many Americans have negative preconceptions about Muslims that are influenced by media depictions of violent Muslim extremists. The inner core of the US-based Islamophobia network currently consists of at least 37 groups whose major goal is to propagate prejudice and hatred of Islam and Muslims. The network's outer core consists of an additional 32 groups whose primary objective does not appear to entail fostering prejudice against or hatred of Islam and Muslims, but whose work frequently exhibits or supports Islamophobic themes. Between 2008 and 2011, the inner core of the US-based Islamophobia network received at least $119,662,719 in total revenue. 

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Anti-Muslim hostility has risen in recent years. Although these emotions can develop in a variety of ways, attacks on mosques are a direct attack on religious liberty. Across the country, mosques have been vandalized and other criminal acts have occurred, and attempts have been made to obstruct or refuse necessary zoning permits for the building and expansion of other institutions.

Religion and culture outnumber politics as the primary source of animosity between the Muslim and Western worlds in every place assessed. This is relevant in talks about Islamophobia because political interests can shift and alter over time, whereas cultural and religious distinctions are more deeply embedded within populations.

In the United States, religion has a racial connotation. Even though no single ethnic group accounts for more than 30% of the Muslim population, Muslims are classed as people of color. A convergence of racial and religious discrimination is at the heart of Islamophobia in the United States. Hate crimes against Muslims in the United States are a human rights violation rooted in institutional discrimination and ostracization (Tayyaba, 2022).

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, released a report "Islamophobia in the Mainstream" which listed 35 charitable institutions that channeled nearly $106 million to 26 anti-Muslim groups between 2017 and 2019. Moreover, this report reveals that Islamophobic organizations continue to operate and receive huge sums of money from private family foundations and mainstream donor-advised funds, which are then used to propagate misinformation and perpetuate misconceptions about Muslims and Islam. CAIR's report adds to a long history of research by the organization and others that show how money is routed to anti-Muslim organizations.

Furthermore, Islamophobic organizations have been accused of propagating misleading information about Muslim populations in the United States using social media, the press, public hearings, and other means. CAIR labels organizations as Islamophobic if they support policies that discriminate against Muslims, degrade Muslims because of their faith, or claim that Islam poses an existential threat to the United States. According to CAIR, it’s concerning if anti-Muslim hate groups receive money from mainstream foundations. It also requested the philanthropic community to develop explicit standards to ensure that funding does not go to anti-Muslim organizations, as well as to educate their staff and boards about the magnitude of anti-Muslim discrimination.

Notably, one of the most effective methods to fight this unfavorable impression may be to actively increase exposure to Muslims who do not fit the scary reputation but rather represent the polar opposite. Lowering people's perceptions of Muslims as threatening could diminish support for anti-democratic actions that target Muslims dramatically.