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Updated Thursday, November 19, 2009 9:59 am TWN, AP

Old U.S. mining town elects a Muslim mayor

GRANITE FALLS, Washington -- Granite Falls residents are suspicious of any newcomers, let alone a Muslim native of Pakistan who moved to this rugged, blue-collar mining town to open his own bar.

But 54-year-old Haroon Saleem has thrived, winning over the town with hard work and an easy smile. He has become so popular that, on Nov. 3, he won the mayor's job in a landslide, getting 61 percent of the more than 800 votes cast a result that residents say would have been inconceivable not long ago. “In the old Granite Falls, there were no minorities. It was a rough, rough, logging town. Any outsider, whether a minority or somebody from Everett, was the same.” said Sharon Ashton, a close confidant of Saleem.

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