Politics
NEW: Red State Designates The Muslim Brotherhood As A Terrorist Organization
Texas Governor Greg Abbott on Tuesday moved to designate the Muslim Brotherhood and the Council on American-Islamic Relations as foreign terrorist organizations and transnational criminal organizations. The designation will allow for enhanced enforcement actions against the organizations and their affiliates operating in the state.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), founded in 1994 and headquartered in Washington, D.C., is a prominent nonprofit organization that describes itself as America’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy group, with over 35 regional chapters nationwide. Similarly, the Muslim Brotherhood, established in 1928 by Egyptian schoolteacher Hasan al-Banna in Ismailia, Egypt, emerged as a transnational Sunni Islamist movement aimed at promoting Islamist principles in society and politics.
The Muslim Brotherhood, which boasts millions of members worldwide, advocates for the implementation of Sharia Law in society. It is designated as a terrorist group in countries like Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates due to its historical involvement in violence and opposition to secular governance.
On Tuesday, Governor Abbott announced that both groups would be designated as transnational terrorist and criminal organizations.
“The Muslim Brotherhood and CAIR have long made their goals clear: to forcibly impose Sharia law and establish Islam’s ‘mastership of the world. The actions taken by the Muslim Brotherhood and CAIR to support terrorism across the globe and subvert our laws through violence, intimidation, and harassment are unacceptable,” Abbott announced in a press release.
Both groups and their affiliates will now be prohibited from buying or owning land in the Lone Star State. “These radical extremists are not welcome in our state and are now prohibited from acquiring any real property interest in Texas,” the governor said.
Tuesday’s press release brought attention to the decades-long history of violence and extremism associated with the Muslim Brotherhood. “WHEREAS, Hassan al-Banna, who founded the Muslim Brotherhood almost 100 years ago, professed that ‘Jihad is an obligation from Allah on every Muslim and cannot be ignored nor evaded’ and that Jihad means ‘the fighting of the unbelievers, and involves all possible efforts that are necessary to dismantle the power of the enemies of Islam including beating them, plundering their wealth, destroying their paces of worship and smashing their idols,” Abbott wrote.
Several Texas lawmakers had been lobbying for such a designation due to rapidly increasing numbers of Islamists entering the state, some of whom have developed plans for an all-Muslim community located just north of Dallas.
U.S. Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX), who is currently running for attorney general in the Lone Star state, has called for legislation that would deport Sharia law followers from the United States and crack down on radical groups. “America is facing an existential threat — the spread of Sharia Law,” Roy warned in a statement earlier this month. “From Texas to every state in the union, instances of Sharia Law adherents have threatened the American way of life, seeking to replace our legal system and Constitution with an incompatible ideology that diminishes the rights of women, children, and individuals of different faiths.”
The measure would direct top federal officials — including the Secretaries of State and Homeland Security and the Attorney General — to “deny any immigration benefit, visa, immigration relief, or admission to the United States to any alien who adheres to Sharia law.”
It also mandates that any foreign national found to be a Sharia-law adherent “shall have any immigration benefit, immigration relief, or visa revoked, be considered inadmissible or deportable, and shall be removed from the United States.”
