Mehmet Oz, celebrity physician and US Republican Senate candidate for Pennsylvania, speaks during a primary election night event in Newtown, Pennsylvania, US, on May 17, 2022. (Michelle Gustafson/Bloomberg via Getty ImagesGustafson/Bloomberg via Gett HARRISBURG, Pa. - If Dr.
Mehmet Oz is elected to the U.S. Senate this fall, he'll be the first Muslim ever to serve in the chamber. It's something he hardly brings up while campaigning, his Democratic opponent isn't raising it and it's barely a topic of conversation in Pennsylvania's Muslim community.Even if Muslims know that Oz — the celebrity heart surgeon best known as the host of daytime TV’s "The Dr.
Oz Show" — is a fellow Muslim, many may not identify with him culturally or politically.And in any case, Muslims aren't monolithic and won't necessarily vote for a candidate just because they share a religion, Muslims across the state say — he'll have to win them over on the issues just as with all voters.RELATED: Oz wins Pennsylvania Senate primary ahead of showdown with FettermanOz, whose parents emigrated from Turkey, calls himself a "secular Muslim" and has said that the spiritual side of Islam resonates with him more than the religious law side of it.He is also part of a Republican Party that is a political minority among Muslims and is endorsed by former President Donald Trump, who earned the enmity of some Muslims for enacting a 2017 ban on travelers coming to the United States from five predominantly Muslim countries.For a Republican Party more accustomed to electing white Christians, Oz’s religion is a strange bedfellow.