The Huffington Post pointed out that American Muslim advocates contend that the real intent of Cruz's bill has little to do with foreign policy, rather the legislation would enable the U.S. government to target domestic Muslim groups that Cruz and others earnestly believe are part of a massive, covert conspiracy to destroy the U.S. from within.
"Proponents of the measure, including members of Trump's incoming administration, have long used the Muslim Brotherhood label as shorthand for Muslim organizations, politicians and government officials with whom they disagree, and civil rights advocates fear those allegations could be used as pretext to investigate and alienate those who challenge the government's treatment of Muslims" the Washington Post said adding:
"Supporters of the designation have wielded it most frequently against advocacy groups such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), which regularly files lawsuits on behalf of Muslims over alleged discrimination, as well as against charities. They have also used it to attack Democratic members of Congress, Muslim government officials, longtime Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin and the Gold Star father Khizr Khan, who criticized Trump at the Democratic National Convention in the summer."
Ted Cruz vs. The Muslim Brotherhood Boogeyman: The Huffington Post
The Huffington Post pointed out that for years anti-Muslim groups have claimed that CAIR, the country's largest Muslim civil rights organization, and other pro-Islam groups in the U.S. are, in fact, fronts for the Muslim Brotherhood.
J.M. Berger, a counterterrorism analyst at George Washington University's Program on Extremism, was quoted as saying: "This initiative is concerned with controlling American Muslims, not with any issue pertaining to the Muslim Brotherhood in any practical or realistic sense."
Lana Safah, a spokeswoman for the Muslim American Society, another high-profile Muslim advocacy group, told Huffington Post that her group has "no affiliation with any foreign or international organization." Yet, she said, "In the Trump era, and in the most Islamophobic atmosphere the American Muslim community has ever experienced, it seems we should expect the unexpected, such as this unprecedented designation, which no former administration has made. It would cripple the operations of any Muslim organizations linked, however circumstantially, to the Muslim Brotherhood.
Nathan Lean, author of the 2012 book The Islamophobia Industry, says designating the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist group could give government officials cover to effectively dismantle U.S. Muslim groups. And that, he fears, would lead to "the wanton violation of American Muslim civil rights."
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