The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) is advertising to start a chapter in Louisiana. This item has been circulating around the internet in the past few days…

This cannot be viewed as a positive development, though we certainly cannot depend on the so-called “mainstream” news media to report it.

There are lots of reasons why having CAIR operate in a state is undesirable (to put it mildly) but the best explanation comes from a resolution passed by the Louisiana House of Representatives back in the 2016 regular session:

2016 Regular Session

HOUSE RESOLUTION NO. 170

A RESOLUTION

To urge and request law enforcement and governmental agencies in Louisiana to avoid and suspend all formal contacts and formal outreach activities with the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR).

WHEREAS, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has suspended all formal contacts

and formal outreach activities with the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) due to evidence indicating a relationship between CAIR and Hamas, a designated foreign terrorist organization; and

WHEREAS, one of CAIR’s directors was sentenced to a year in federal prison for violating U.S. sanctions against Iraq; and

WHEREAS, a CAIR director in Virginia pled guilty to terrorism-related financial and conspiracy charges, which resulted in a federal prison sentence; and

WHEREAS, a communications specialist and civil rights coordinator for CAIR trained with an al Qaeda-tied Kashmir organization that is listed on the Department of State’s international terror list and was also indicted on charges of conspiring to help al Qaeda and the Taliban battle American troops in Afghanistan and was sentenced to twenty years in prison; and

WHEREAS, CAIR’s former community affairs director pled guilty to three federal counts of bank and visa fraud and agreed to be deported to Egypt after he had funneled money to activities supporting terrorism and had published material advocating suicide attacks against the United States; these illegal activities took place while he was employed by CAIR; and

WHEREAS, a CAIR fund raiser was arrested on terrorism-related charges and was deported from the United States due to his work as executive director of the Global Relief Foundation, which was designated as a fundraising front organization for a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. Treasury Department for financing al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations; and

WHEREAS, CAIR opened its first office in Washington, D.C., with the help of a grant from the Holy Land Foundation; and

WHEREAS, the federal case against the Holy Land Foundation, a charitable organization that was shut down by the United States Department of the Treasury for funding Jihadist terrorist organizations, was the largest successful terrorism financing prosecution in U.S. history, and the case identified CAIR as a Muslim Brotherhood front group, and CAIR was named an unindicted co-conspirator in the trial; and

WHEREAS, the cofounder of CAIR’s parent organization, Islamic Association for Palestine, was sentenced to prison on terrorism charges for financing Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a designated terrorist organization.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the House of Representatives of the Legislature of Louisiana does urge and request law enforcement and governmental agencies in Louisiana to avoid and suspend all formal contacts and formal outreach activities with the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR).

Interestingly, Louisiana is not the only state that has seen its legislature to pass such a resolution. Arkansas passed an even stronger version through its House and Senate in 2019:

Note that the Senate resolution in Arkansas had 24 co-sponsors out of 35 members of the chamber.

Opposition to CAIR does not equate to opposition to Muslims or the Muslim community. CAIR actually has a tiny membership with shadowy funding sources.  Opposition to CAIR is just that: opposition to an organization with a history that all Americans should be concerned about, because when you look past their talking points and examine their actual record there is plenty to be disturbed about.