Broadstancing Muslim politicians: Advocating for gender equality erases voter bias against Muslim politicians without causing backlash from Muslim voters

Minoritised politicians often distance themselves from expectations associated with their group, possibly provoking backlash from in-group members. We coin the term broadstancing to describe such distancing from a minoritised in-group to broaden electoral appeal, and we provide the first empirical evidence of the effectiveness of this strategy for Muslim politicians. Using a survey experiment with 3,052 respondents in France, Germany, and the Netherlands, including an oversample of Muslim respondents, we examine voter responses to Muslim politicians who support or oppose contested policies associated with Muslims. We find that voters overall are significantly less biased against Muslim politicians who distance themselves from such policies. However, this strategy incurs in-group costs: Muslim voters are less likely to support Muslim politicians who engage in broadstancing. An important exception is gender equality, which is strongly preferred by voters across groups. These findings highlight both strategies for political acceptance and the conditionality of Muslim representation.