Was there a backlash against Muslims after September 11? There have been a number of polls asking if people have very favorable, somewhat (or mostly) favorable, somewhat/mostly unfavorable, or very unfavorable opinions of Muslims, dating back to the late 90s. I computed a summary measure counting very favorable as +2, somewhat favorable as +1, somewhat unfavorable as -1, and very unfavorable ass -2 (people who said they didn't know or couldn't rate them were counted as zero). Some surveys just asked about "Muslims," others about "American Muslims," or "Muslim Americans." I thought that might make a difference, so I distinguish the forms in this figure:
Opinions became more favorable after 9/11--in fact, the rating from November 2001 is the highest ever, although that may be partly due to the "Muslim American" wording. Over the long term, opinions may have become more favorable, and certainly haven't become less favorable. There's one survey from August 2010 that is an outlier, showing more negative opinions. That may be because it was prefaced with a statement saying that they were going to ask about some religions--that might have led respondents to think about doctrine rather than people. But regardless of how you interpret that survey, there's no evidence of a general backlash.
Of course, I'm not denying that harassment of Muslims increased after 9/11--people with negative views became more motivated to act on them. Some security measures that were adopted with popular support may have also had disproportionate negative effects on Muslims. But in terms of general public opinion, there was not a rise in anti-Muslim feelings after September 11, or the years after. That's the paradox of Trump's success--it came in a time when prejudice had declined and was continuing to decline.
[Data from the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research]
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