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IDENTIFYING THE ENEMY: RADICAL ISLAMIST 

TERROR 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

OVERSIGHT AND 

MANAGEMENT EFFICIENCY 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

SEPTEMBER 22, 2016 

Serial No. 114–88 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/ 


Congress.#13
(II) 

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas, Chairman 

LAMAR SMITH, Texas 

PETER T. KING, New York 

MIKE ROGERS, Alabama 

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan, Vice Chair 

JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

LOU BARLETTA, Pennsylvania 

SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania 

CURT CLAWSON, Florida 

JOHN KATKO, New York 

WILL HURD, Texas 

EARL L. ‘‘BUDDY’’ CARTER, Georgia 

MARK WALKER, North Carolina 

BARRY LOUDERMILK, Georgia 

MARTHA MCSALLY, Arizona 

JOHN RATCLIFFE, Texas 

DANIEL M. DONOVAN, JR., New York 

BENNIE G. THOMPSON, Mississippi 

LORETTA SANCHEZ, California 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York 

CEDRIC L. RICHMOND, Louisiana 

WILLIAM R. KEATING, Massachusetts 

DONALD M. PAYNE, JR., New Jersey 

FILEMON VELA, Texas 

BONNIE WATSON COLEMAN, New Jersey 

KATHLEEN M. RICE, New York 

NORMA J. TORRES, California 

BRENDAN P. SHIELDS, Staff Director 

JOAN V. O’HARA, General Counsel 

MICHAEL S. TWINCHEK, Chief Clerk 

I. LANIER AVANT, Minority Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND MANAGEMENT EFFICIENCY 

SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania, Chairman 

JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina 

CURT CLAWSON, Florida 

EARL L. ‘‘BUDDY’’ CARTER, Georgia 

BARRY LOUDERMILK, Georgia 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas (ex officio) 

BONNIE WATSON COLEMAN, New Jersey 

CEDRIC L. RICHMOND, Louisiana 

NORMA J. TORRES, California 

BENNIE G. THOMPSON, Mississippi (ex officio) 

RYAN CONSAUL, Subcommittee Staff Director 

KRIS CARLSON, Subcommittee Clerk 

CEDRIC C. HAYNES, Minority Subcommittee Staff Director 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

STATEMENTS 

The Honorable Scott Perry, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Pennsylvania, and Chairman, Subcommittee on Oversight and Management Efficiency ..................................................................................................... 1 

The Honorable Bonnie Watson Coleman, a Representative in Congress From 

the State of New Jersey, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Oversight 

and Management Efficiency: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 8 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 9 

The Honorable Bennie G. Thompson, a Representative in Congress From 

the State of Mississippi, and Ranking Member, Committee on Homeland 

Security: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 10 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 12 

WITNESSES 

PANEL I 

Mr. George Selim, Director, Office of Community Partnerships, U.S. Department of Homeland Security: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 13 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 15 

PANEL II 

Hon. Peter Hoekstra, Former Chairman, House Permanent Select Committee 

on Intelligence: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 39 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 41 

Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, President, American Islamic Forum for Democracy: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 45 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 47 

Ms. Sahar F. Aziz, Professor of Law, Texas A&M University School of Law: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 62 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 64 

Ms. Shireen Qudosi, Senior Contributor, Counterjihad.com: 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 78 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 80 

FOR THE RECORD 

The Honorable Scott Perry, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Pennsylvania, and Chairman, Subcommittee on Oversight and Management Efficiency: 

Article, Washington Post ..................................................................................... 3 

Article, Middle East Briefing .............................................................................. 4 

Article, Middle East Briefing .............................................................................. 6 

Article, Gulf News Report .................................................................................... 7 

APPENDIX 

Questions From Honorable Barry Loudermilk for George Selim ........................ 101 

(1) 

IDENTIFYING THE ENEMY: RADICAL 

ISLAMIST TERROR 

Thursday, September 22, 2016 

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY, SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND

MANAGEMENT EFFICIENCY, Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:08 a.m., in room 

311, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Scott Perry (Chairman of 

the subcommittee) presiding. 

Present: Representatives Perry, Duncan, Clawson, Loudermilk, 

Watson Coleman, Thompson, Torres, and Jackson Lee. 

Also present: Representatives Meadows, Pascrell, and Ellison. 

Mr. PERRY. Good morning. The Committee on Homeland Security’s Subcommittee on Oversight and Management Efficiency will 

come to order. The purpose of this hearing is to examine the threat 

of radical Islamist terrorism and ways to defeat it. The Chair now 

recognizes himself for an opening statement. 

From Muhammed Abdulazeez in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Nidal 

Hasan in Fort Hood, Texas to Syed Farook in San Bernardino, 

California, radical Islamist terrorism is becoming more and more 

frequent and devastating. According to the Committee on Homeland Security’s September 2016 terror threat snapshot, since 2014 

there have been 105 ISIS-linked plots to attack the West, 30 of 

those in the United States. 

In 2016 alone, 214 people have been murdered in terrorist attacks against the West and just a few months ago, the deadliest 

post-9/11 terror attack on American soil occurred when Islamist 

terrorist Omar Mateen massacred 49 innocent people in an Orlando nightclub. 

Unfortunately, the Obama administration is more focused on 

being politically correct in its terminology than actually confronting 

this growing cancer, evidenced by, among other things, the unnecessary censorship of Omar Mateen’s 9/11 call transcript. 

In a joint statement with the FBI, the Department of Justice 

said, the purpose of releasing the redacted transcript was not wanting to provide the killer or terrorist organizations with a publicity 

platform for hateful propaganda, while still providing transparency. 

Omitting Omar Mateen’s pledge of allegiance to ISIS is one of 

many examples of the willful ignorance of this administration in 

confronting the threat of radical Islamist terror. 

If anyone sincerely questions the assertion, you have to look no 

further than 4 days ago when in response to the Islamist extremist 

2 

attacks in New York, New Jersey, and Minnesota, White House 

spokesperson Josh Earnest, said when it comes to ISIL, and this 

is in quotes—‘‘We are in a fight, a narrative fight with them, a narrative battle,’’ That is great. We fight with feckless terms and they 

slaughter our citizens. 

While the administration says it refrains from using certain 

terms so as not to condemn an entire religion, former Speaker of 

the House Newt Gingrich has said, ‘‘It is extraordinary that the political correctness of Western elites has discouraged the study of 

what inspires those who dream of slaughtering us. We must understand the deep roots of Islamist beliefs if we are going to combat 

them. It is long past time to stop hiding behind the facade of political correctness.’’ 

‘‘Radical Islamist terrorists are the ones who threaten our freedoms and threaten our way of life, not the millions of Muslims who 

value peace with their American brothers and sisters. It is welldocumented that these terrorists murder more peaceful Muslims 

for their resistance to Sharia adherence than any other group of 

people. If we are unwilling or afraid to name our enemy and to dig 

deep into their ideological motivations, how will we ever destroy 

this scourge?’’ 

Retired Army Lieutenant General and former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency Michael Flynn said it best. ‘‘We are in a 

world war against a Messianic mass movement of evil people, most 

of them inspired by a totalitarian ideology, radical Islam. But we 

are not permitted to speak or write those two words, which is potentially fatal to our culture. We can’t beat them if we don’t understand them and are afraid to define them, but our political leaders 

haven’t permitted that.’’ 

‘‘We are not allowed to use the phrase radical Islam or Islamists. 

That has got to change. By disavowing the use of specific phrases 

and by denying contributing factors to this extremist movement, 

the administration is undercutting prominent Muslims who truly 

understand that reforming Islam must come from within. We must 

target the root causes of radicalization instead of waiting until 

countless more of our citizens are murdered by these radicals and 

then playing defense after the fact.’’ 

The Department of Homeland Security was established in response to the tragic terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. DHS 

currently is the lead Federal agency in an initiative known as 

countering violent extremism or CVE. 

For example, in September 2015, DHS created the Office of Community Partnerships to counter violent extremism by coordinating 

efforts among Federal agencies. Congress already appropriated $10 

million to DHS for CVE grants for fiscal year 2016, but we have 

no way of gauging whether CVE efforts have been successful or 

harmful or if the money is being spent wisely. 

Additionally, in September 2015, the Department’s Homeland Security Advisor Council, or HSHC, established a Countering Violent 

Extremism Subcommittee. However, I was appalled and frankly 

disgusted to learn that a person who tweeted that the 9/11 attacks 

changed the world for good was even considered, let alone asked to 

be a member of this group, tasked with providing advice to senior 

Government officials responsible for the safety of our Nation. 

3 

In addition, DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson became the first cabinet 

secretary to address the Islamic Society of North America’s annual 

conference, addressing an organization that was an unindicted coconspirator in the Holy Land Foundation investigation, the largest 

terror financing investigation in American history, is astounding. 

Not only are these examples exceptionally troubling at best, they 

call into question the Department’s judgment and allegiance when 

it comes to defeating this obvious threat. The scale of these questions is made clear when observers consider the outcome of the 

Holy Land Foundation proceedings. Along with their plan, uncovered was the Muslim Brotherhood’s goal of eliminating and destroying civilization—American civilization. 

Juxtapose that fact with the President’s issuance of Presidential 

Study Directive 11. While the document remains Classified, opensource reporting by the Washington Post, Gulf News, and Middle 

East Briefing found that in 2010, the Obama administration abandoned the long-standing policy of dealing with current regimes to 

ensure Middle East/North Africa stability and instead implemented 

by the State Department, transitioned recklessly into a policy of 

promoting and steering political change in targeted countries including Egypt, Libya, Yemen, and Syria by partnering directly with 

the Muslim brotherhood. 

I am sure I don’t need to remind anyone here of the breathtaking, costly, and unprecedented failures of these irresponsible actions. 

The purpose of this hearing is to gain an outside perspective on 

the real threat that faces our Nation. Does our Government truly 

understand the extent of radical Islamist terror and what needs to 

be done to combat it? I hope this hearing will provide much insight 

and needed insight into the next actions we should take to fulfill 

our Constitutional duty in protecting this country and its ideals. It 

is time for us to identify the enemy and destroy it. 

With that, I would like to request unanimous consent to enter 

into the record the open-source documents regarding the Presidential Study Directive 11 into the record. 

Without objection so ordered. 

[The information referred to follows:] 

OBAMA’S LOW-KEY STRATEGY FOR THE MIDDLE EAST

By David Ignatius, Washington Post, Sunday, March 6, 2011 

President Obama has been so low-key in his pronouncements about events in 

Egypt and Libya that it’s easy to miss the extent of the shift in U.S. strategy. In 

supporting the wave of change sweeping the Arab world, despite the wariness of traditional allies such as Israel and Saudi Arabia, Obama is placing a big bet that 

democratic governments will be more stable and secure, and thereby enhance U.S. 

interests in the region. 

My own instinct, as someone who has been visiting the Arab world for more than 

30 years, is that Obama is right. But given the stakes, it’s important to examine 

how the White House is making its judgments—and whether intelligence reporting 

supports these decisions. 

Though the White House’s response to these whirlwind events has sometimes 

seemed erratic, the policy, which has been evolving for many months, goes to the 

core of Obama’s worldview. This is the president as global community organizer— 

a man who believes that change is inevitable and desirable, and that the United 

States must align itself with the new forces shaping the world. 

An Israeli official visiting Washington last week sounded a note of caution: ‘‘We 

are too close to the eye of the storm to judge,’’ he said. ‘‘We need to be more modest 

in our assessments and put more question marks at the end.’’ 

4 

But the Obama White House doesn’t feel it has the luxury of deferring judgment; 

history is moving too fast. Says one official, ‘‘It’s a roll of the dice, but it’s also a 

response to reality.’’ If Obama has seemed low-key, he explains, it has been a calculated ‘‘strategic reticence’’ to send the message: This is your revolution; it’s not 

about us. 

The roots of the policy shift go back to Obama’s first days in office and his feeling 

that America’s relationship with the Arab world was broken. Though Obama 

seemed to be accommodating the region’s authoritarian leaders, in August 2010, he 

issued Presidential Study Directive 11, asking agencies to prepare for change. 

This document cited ‘‘evidence of growing citizen discontent with the region’s regimes’’ and warned that ‘‘the region is entering a critical period of transition.’’ The 

president asked his advisers to ‘‘manage these risks by demonstrating to the people 

of the Middle East and North Africa the gradual but real prospect of greater political openness and improved governance.’’ 

Six months later, street demonstrations were toppling autocratic leaders in Tunisia and Egypt, who looked in vain for support from Washington. Obama didn’t come 

to the autocrats’ rescue because he believed the transformations were positive developments. ‘‘We have a core interest in stability through political and economic 

change. The status quo is not stable,’’ explains Ben Rhodes, a deputy national security adviser. 

The democratic youth movement sweeping the Arab world offered an ‘‘alternative 

narrative’’ to the versions of Islamic revolution put forward by Iran and al-Qaeda, 

says Rhodes. If this change scenario can succeed, threats to America will be reduced. 

The White House studied past democratic transitions in Indonesia, the Philippines, Serbia, Poland and Chile for ‘‘lessons learned.’’ Officials noted that last 

week national security adviser Tom Donilon was reading former secretary of state 

George Shultz’s account of the peaceful ouster of Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines. 

This review has led U.S. officials to conclude that countries need to: bring the opposition quickly into the transition to achieve ‘‘buy-in’’; make fast changes that people can see, such as freeing political prisoners; and sequence events, putting the 

easiest first, so that presidential elections precede parliamentary balloting and detailed rewriting of the constitution. 

How well does this idealistic agenda match up with ground truth? In interviews 

last week, intelligence analysts said that Islamic extremists don’t seem to be hijacking the process of change. There are near-term tactical dangers, said one counterterrorism analyst, such as the escape of prisoners in Egypt and the potential weakening of the intelligence service there. But this official says there’s no evidence that 

al-Qaeda has been able to take advantage of the turmoil. It took a week for Ayman 

al-Zawahiri, the group’s No. 2 official, to publish his windy and out-of-touch analysis 

of events in Egypt. 

Change will have its downside, but a second U.S. intelligence analyst offers this 

estimate: ‘‘This is a world we can live with. Our relationship with Egypt may be 

different and rockier, but I don’t think it will be inherently hostile.’’ As for the 

much-feared Muslim Brotherhood, it is currently planning to run parliamentary 

candidates in only 150 of Egypt’s 454 districts, and no candidate for president. 

U.S. STATE DEPT. DOCUMENT CONFIRMS REGIME CHANGE AGENDA IN MIDDLE EAST

Middle East Briefing, June 9, 2014 

The Obama Administration has been pursuing a policy of covert support for the 

Muslim Brotherhood and other insurgent movements in the Middle East since 2010. 

MEB has obtained a just-released U.S. State Department document through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit that confirms the Obama Administration’s pro-active campaign for regime change throughout the Middle East and North Africa region. 

The October 22, 2010 document, titled ‘‘Middle East Partnership Initiative: Overview,’’ spells out an elaborate structure of State Department programs aimed at directly building ‘‘civil society’’ organizations, particularly non-governmental organizations (NGOs), to alter the internal politics of the targeted countries in favor of U.S. 

foreign policy and national security objectives. 

The five-page document, while using diplomatic language, makes clear that the 

goal is promoting and steering political change in the targeted countries: ‘‘The Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) is a regional program that empowers citizens 

in the Middle East and North Africa to develop more pluralistic, participatory, and 

prosperous societies. As the figures in this overview illustrate, MEPI has evolved 

5 

from its origins in 2002 into a flexible, region-wide tool for direct support to indigenous civil society that mainstreams that support into the daily business of USG diplomacy in the region. MEPI engages all the countries of the NEA region except 

Iran. In the seven of NEA’s eighteen countries and territories with USAID missions, 

country-level discussions and communication between MEPI and USAID in Washington ensure that programming efforts are integrated and complementary.’’ 

In a section of the document titled ‘‘How MEPI Works,’’ three core elements of 

the program were spelled out: region-wide and multi-country programming, local 

grants, and country-specific projects. The objectives of the region-wide and multicountry programming were described as: ‘‘builds networks of reformers to learn from 

and support one another, and to catalyze progressive change in the region.’’ The 

local grants ‘‘provide direct support to indigenous civic groups, and now represent 

more than half of MEPI’s projects.’’ Under the country-specific aspect of the program, designated officers of the U.S. embassies manage the funding and work as 

direct liaisons to the various funded local NGOs and other civil society groups. The 

‘‘country-specific projects’’ are tasked ‘‘to respond to local developments and local 

needs, as identified by our embassies, local reformers, and our own field analysis. 

Political developments in a country may produce new opportunities or challenges for 

USG policy goals, and MEPI will shift funds to respond to these needs.’’ 

According to the October 2010 document, the Deputy Chief of Mission (DCM) at 

every U.S. embassy in the MENA (Middle East/North Africa) is in charge of the 

MEPI program, giving it a clear high priority. The document makes clear that the 

Middle East Partnership Initiative is not coordinated with host governments: ‘‘MEPI 

works primarily with civil society, through NGO implementers based in the United 

States and in the region. MEPI does not provide funds to foreign governments, and 

does not negotiate bilateral assistance agreements. As a regional program, MEPI 

can shift funds across countries and to new issue-areas as needed.’’ 

The document makes clear that special priority, as early as 2010, was given to 

Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Egypt and Bahrain, and that project headquarters 

in Abu Dhabi and Tunis were overall coordinating centers for the entire regional 

program. Within a year of its inception, Libya and Syria were added to the list of 

countries on the priority list for civil society intervention. 

The State Department document was released as part of an FOIA suit focused on 

Presidential Study Directive 11, which remains classified ‘‘secret’’ and has not yet 

been released to the public. According to MEB sources, PSD–11 spelled out the 

Obama Administration’s plans to support the Muslim Brotherhood and other allied 

‘‘political Islam’’ movements believed at the time to be compatible with U.S. foreign 

policy objectives in the region. 

The MEPI is currently directed by Paul Sutphin, who was previously U.S. consul 

general in Erbil, Iraq and more recently, Director of the Office of Israel and Palestinian Affairs at the State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs. His deputy 

is Catherin Bourgeois, who was first assigned to MEPI in February 2009 as Division 

Chief of Policy and Programming. Her past State Department assignments have involved the development of Information Technology uses in advancing U.S. foreign 

policy goals. 

Two other senior State Department officials have overseen the development and 

expansion of the program since the drafting of the October 2010 MEPI document, 

spelling out its transformation into a regime-change force. Tomicah S. Tillemann is 

the Senior Advisor for Civil Society and Emerging Democracies, appointed to that 

post by then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in October 2010. He remains in that 

post under Secretary John Kerry. He was the founder of the Lantos Foundation for 

Human Rights and Justice, itself an NGO named after Tilleman’s grandfather, the 

former U.S. Congressman, Tom Lantos. 

In September 2011, Ambassador William B. Taylor was appointed to head the 

then-newly established Office of the Special Coordinator for Middle East Transitions, after having served as the U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine during the ‘‘Orange 

Revolution’’ of 2006–2009. According to a State Department paper, ‘‘The Office of the 

Special Coordinator for Middle East Transitions (D/MET), established in September 

2011, coordinates United States Government assistance to incipient democracies 

arising from popular revolts across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. The Special Coordinator for Middle East Transitions implements a coordinated 

interagency strategy to support designated MENA countries undergoing transitions 

to democracy-currently, Egypt, Tunisia, and Libya.’’ 

The complete State Department documents released under the FOIA will soon be 

available as part of a comprehensive MEB Special Report now in production on the 

regime-change program and its consequences for the region. For upcoming details 

on this report, check the MEB website. 

6 

THE CASE OF EGYPT (2): SIX MONTHS OF INSIDER EMAILS FROM OBAMA

ADMINISTRATION SHOW GROUNDWORK FOR MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD POWER GRABS

Middle East Briefing 

In an ongoing Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, the Obama Administration has 

released scores of internal emails, all heavily redacted, which nevertheless detail a 

six month White House-led review of prospects of Muslim Brotherhood Islamic rule 

in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. The Obama Administration 

policy planning review took place between September 2010 and February 2011. 

The review process, headed by National Security Council staffers Dennis Ross, 

Samantha Power, Gayle Smith, Ben Rhodes and Michael McFaul, began with President Obama’s signing of Presidential Study Directive 11 (PSD–11) in August 2010, 

demanding a government-wide reassessment of the prospects of political reform and 

the potential role of the Muslim Brotherhood throughout the MENA region. All told, 

dozens of officials from the NSC and the State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, Office of Middle East Transitions, Office of Senior Advisor for Civil Society and Emerging Democracies, the Secretary’s Policy Planning staff, and the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor took part in the six month review. 

A careful review of 98 emails between White House, National Security Council 

and State Department officials reveals that the review concluded that the Muslim 

Brotherhood was a viable movement for the U.S. to support throughout North Africa 

and the Middle East. As the result, under Presidential direction, American diplomats intensified contacts with top Muslim Brotherhood leaders and gave active 

support to the organization’s drive for power in key nations like Egypt, Libya, Tunisia and Syria, beginning in early 2011 at the outset of the ‘‘Arab Spring.’’ 

Talking Points prepared for Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for a June 30, 2011 

visit to Budapest, Hungary headlined ‘‘Muslim Brotherhood Q&A,’’ written by the 

Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs’ Office of Press & Public Diplomacy, ‘‘welcomed dialogue with the Muslim Brotherhood,’’ particularly in Egypt. The Talking Points emphasized that the U.S. was willing to talk to ‘‘all parties committed to nonviolence,’’ 

and specifically praised the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood for their ‘‘inclusion of 

women.’’ The prepared answers also noted that U.S. contact with the Muslim Brotherhood ‘‘has occurred off and on since the 1980s,’’ but that these contacts would no 

longer be restricted to elected parliamentarians only. 

A State Department memo from Michael A. Hammer to Jeffrey D. Feltman, Anne 

W. Patterson, Jacob Walles and Roopa Rangaswamy, also dated June 30, 2011, 

noted that ‘‘S got the question at her presser in Budapest a short while ago,’’ and 

her answer closely followed the Talking Points prepared for her. Secretary Clinton 

told the press conference questioner 

‘‘There is no U.S. legal prohibition against dealing with the Muslim Brotherhood 

itself, which long ago renounced violence as a means to achieve political change in 

Egypt and which is not regarded by Washington as a foreign terrorist organization. 

But other sympathetic groups, such as Hamas, which identifies the Brotherhood as 

its spiritual guide, have not disavowed violence against the state of Israel.’’ 

The Obama Administration’s support for the Brotherhood only first began to be 

questioned in November–December 2012, after Egyptian President Mohammed 

Morsi ordered a violent crackdown on peaceful protesters outside the presidential 

residency, who were demanding more inclusive rule and economic progress. At that 

time, American officials confirmed that the Muslim Brotherhood had deployed its 

own paramilitary squads to kidnap some protesters and hold them in secret locations with no judicial review or court authority. Some of those victims were badly 

beaten before being eventually released. 

Up until now, the Justice Department has invoked secrecy to block the release 

of PSD–11 and the February 16, 2011 PDD–13 study on the prospects of Muslim 

Brotherhood rule in Egypt and other countries of the region. It is anticipated that 

this decision by the State Department and the Justice Department will be challenged in Federal court in Washington, D.C. sometime later this year. 

The original PSD–11, an 18-page classified paper, demanded a detailed blueprint 

for how the U.S. could ‘‘push for political change’’ in countries with ‘‘autocratic rulers’’ who are historic allies of the United States. 

As part of the study, the Obama National Security Council and key State Department officials reviewed the consequences of the U.S. rejection of the 2006 Palestinian parliamentary elections, which were won by Hamas. The February 16, 2011 

secret paper concluded that the Muslim Brotherhood’s brand of political Islam, combined with its fervent nationalism, could lead to reform and stability. 

The study, conducted over the previous 6-month period by an Interagency Policy 

Committee chaired by the NSC, drew a sharp contrast between al-Qaeda and the 

7 

Muslim Brotherhood, despite evidence of frequent overlaps of personnel and ideology. One unnamed administration official who helped draft the Feb. 16, 2011 

PPD–13, stated in March 2011, ‘‘If our policy can’t distinguish between al-Qaeda 

and the Muslim Brotherhood, we won’t be able to adapt to this change. We’re also 

not going to allow ourselves to be driven by fear.’’ 

US DOCUMENT REVEALS COOPERATION BETWEEN WASHINGTON AND BROTHERHOOD

STUDIES COMMISSIONED BY THE PRESIDENT CONCLUDED THAT THE US SHOULD BACK

‘‘MODERATE ISLAMISTS’’ IN THE REGION

Gulf News Report, Published: 19:32 June 18, 2014 

Dubai: For the past decade, two successive US administrations have maintained 

close ties to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Tunisia, Syria and Libya, to name 

just the most prominent cases. 

The Obama administration conducted an assessment of the Muslim Brotherhood 

in 2010 and 2011, beginning even before the events known as the ‘‘Arab Spring’’ 

erupted in Tunisia and in Egypt. The President personally issued Presidential Study 

Directive 11 (PSD–11) in 2010, ordering an assessment of the Muslim Brotherhood 

and other ‘‘political Islamist’’ movements, including the ruling AKP in Turkey, ultimately concluding that the United States should shift from its longstanding policy 

of supporting ‘‘stability’’ in the Middle East and North Africa (that is, support for 

‘‘stable regimes’’ even if they were authoritarian), to a policy of backing ‘‘moderate’’ 

Islamic political movements. 

To this day, PSD–11 remains classified, in part because it reveals an embarrassingly naive and uninformed view of trends in the Middle East and North Africa 

(Mena) region. 

The revelations were made by Al Hewar centre in Washington, DC, which obtained the documents in question. 

Through an ongoing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit, thousands of 

pages of documentation of the US State Department’s dealings with the Muslim 

Brotherhood are in the process of being declassified and released to the public. 

US State Department documents obtained under the FOIA confirm that the 

Obama administration maintained frequent contact and ties with the Libyan Muslim Brotherhood. At one point, in April 2012, US officials arranged for the public 

relations director of the Libyan Muslim Brotherhood, Mohammad Gaair, to come to 

Washington to speak at a conference on ‘‘Islamists in Power’’ hosted by the Carnegie 

Endowment for International Peace. 

A State Department Cable classified ‘‘Confidential’’ report says the following: 

‘‘Benghazi Meeting With Libyan Muslim Brotherhood: On April 2 [2012] Mission 

Benghazi met with a senior member of the Muslim Brotherhood steering committee, 

who will speak at the April 5 Carnegie Endowment ‘Islamist in Power’ conference 

in Washington, D.C. He described the Muslim Brotherhood’s decision to form a political party as both an opportunity and an obligation in post-revolution Libya after 

years of operating underground. The Brotherhood’s Justice and Construction Party 

would likely have a strong showing in the upcoming elections, he said, based on the 

strength of the Brotherhood’s network in Libya, its broad support, the fact that it 

is a truly national party, and that 25 percent of its members were women. He described the current relationship between the Brotherhood and the TNC (Transitional National Council) as ‘lukewarm.’ ’’ 

Another State Department paper marked ‘‘Sensitive But Unclassified (SBU)’’ contained talking points for Deputy Secretary of State William Burns’ scheduled July 

14, 2012 meeting with Mohammad Sawan, the Muslim Brotherhood leader who was 

also head of the Brotherhood’s Justice and Construction Party. The document is 

heavily redacted, but nevertheless provides clear indication of Washington’s sympathies for the emergence of the Muslim Brotherhood as a major political force in 

the post-Gaddafi Libya. The talking points recommended that Secretary Burns tell 

Sawan that the US government entities ‘‘share your party’s concerns in ensuring 

that a comprehensive transitional justice process is undertaken to address past violations so that they do not spark new discontent.’’ 

The Burns paper described the Libyan Muslim Brotherhood: ‘‘Prior to last year’s 

revolution, the Muslim Brotherhood was banned for over three decades and its 

members were fiercely pursued by the Gaddafi regime. The Libyan Muslim Brotherhood (LMB) returned to Libya last year after years in exile in Europe and the 

United States, selected new leadership and immediately began to plan for an active 

role in Libya’s political future.’’ After a redacted section, the document continued, 

‘‘The LMB-affiliated Justice and Construction party, led by Misratan and former poVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00011 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
8 

litical prisoner under Gaddafi Mohammad Sawan, was created in March 2012. 

Sawan himself was not a candidate in the elections but wields significant influence 

as the head of the largest political party and most influential Islamist party in 

Libya.’’ 

The July 14 meeting was attended by both Secretary Burns and Ambassador 

Christopher Stevens. On September 11, 2012, Ambassador Stevens and three other 

American diplomats were killed in a premeditated terrorist attack on US mission 

and CIA facilities in Benghazi. 

An undated State Department cable revealed further courting of the LMB and its 

Justice and Construction Party. ‘‘Mohammad Sawan, Chairman of Justice and Construction Party, received yesterday at his office in Tripoli, Ambassadors of US, UK, 

FR and IT. The Ambassadors requested the meeting to get acquainted with the party’s position on the current events in Libya, the Government, the Party’s demand 

to sack the Prime Minister, the Constitution, GNC lifetime arguments, dialogue initiatives and Party’s assessment of political and security situation in Libya and the 

region. During the meeting, which took an hour and a half and attended by Mohammad Talb, party’s International Relations officer, and Hussam Naeli, acting liaison 

officer, Sawan explained that the Government has not been able to achieve any success in the core files such as security and local government, which both are under 

the direct supervision of the Prime Minister. Such a failure resulted in the lack of 

security, continuous assassinations, kidnappings, crimes, smuggling and attacks on 

public and private property, halt oil exports and disruption of water and electricity 

supply. Sawan stressed that a solution is possible and the party presented a clear 

solution, but the Government is not in harmony. He added we are responsible only 

for ministries that we take part in.’’ 

The State Department cable noted that ‘‘On their part, the Ambassadors praised 

the active role of the Party in the political scene and confirmed their standing with 

the Libyan people and Government despite its weaknesses and they are keen to stabilize the region . . . At the end of the meeting, Sawan thanked his guests and all 

stressed the need to communicate. The guests affirmed that they will assist through 

Libyan legitimate entities as they did during the revolution.’’ 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair now recognizes the Ranking Member of 

the subcommittee, the gentlelady from New Jersey, Mrs. Watson 

Coleman, for her statement. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Hi. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Before I 

enter into my statement, I want to ask unanimous consent that 

Congressman Ellison participate in today’s hearing and question 

the witnesses. 

Mr. PERRY. Without objection. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. As I am doing this, I also seek unanimous consent that Congressman Pascrell participate in today’s 

hearing and question the witnesses. 

Mr. PERRY. Without objection so ordered. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to 

thank you for holding today’s hearing. I thank the witnesses for 

your testimony that we will hear today. I also would like to thank 

Linden, New Jersey authorities that apprehended the suspected 

New York and New Jersey bomber on Monday. My thoughts and 

my prayers are with the Officers Padilla and Hammer, and I wish 

them a speedy and complete recovery. 

Last week we honored those who lost their lives on September 

11, 2001; 15 years after these horrific attacks, we recognize that 

the terrorist threat to the United States has evolved. No longer do 

terrorists have to travel overseas, for a training or be directed by 

a leader of a terrorist organization in order to cause harm to the 

United States. 

As we have seen from the terrorist attacks in Orlando and in 

Charleston, and quite possibly the attacks in Minnesota and New 

York, terrorist attacks in the United States can be lone actors inVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00012 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
9 

spired by a particular ideology. This ideology can be espoused on 

the internet or in public forums. 

Additionally, propaganda including political discussions, such as 

the name of this hearing, that provide a misnomer to the threat, 

also add to the rhetoric that can inspire a lone actor. Inflammatory 

rhetoric such as a suggestion that the United States should ban or 

surveil certain populations also fuel terrorist groups. I caution 

those with public platforms to be more mindful when addressing 

that threat. 

This is not a matter of being politically correct. This is recognizing that our words resonate beyond these four walls. The words 

we say reach terrorists, both foreign and domestic-inspired. Even 

though we have complicated the situation by debating about labels, 

the Federal Government, including the Department of Homeland 

Security, has renewed its focus on countering violent extremism. 

While the administration states that countering violent extremism is a whole-of-Government approach, DHS is seemingly a Federal Government leader for countering violent extremism. Our witness today is the chair of the Countering Violent Extremism Task 

Force. 

Also, last year DHS created the Office for Community Partnerships and recently established the fiscal year 2016 CVE grant program. These programs were designed to develop and expand efforts 

to counter violent extremist activity. However, while Congress has 

appropriated the funds for these efforts, there has been no CVE 

strategy issued by the Department, and there has been no implementation plan of this strategy submitted to Congress. 

I look forward to hearing from you, Mr. Selim, on specific CVE 

strategy that will be implemented, and I look forward to you resolving the lack of transparency behind the Department’s CVE programs. 

Protecting the American people from terrorist threats is the reason of the Department of Homeland Security, its creation. Therefore, it is imperative that the Department and Congress look at the 

threat picture as a whole. 

So I look forward to hearing from today’s witnesses, their four 

perspectives on the threat to this country, what we are facing and 

the ways in which not only DHS but also the Federal Government 

as a whole can counter violent extremism. 

With that, Mr. Chairman, as we consider today’s subject matter 

and we consider the activities that we need to engage in, the efforts 

that we need to support, and the work that needs to be done and 

not get hung up on the rhetoric of what we call it, I yield back the 

balance of my time. 

[The statement of Ranking Member Watson Coleman follows:] 

STATEMENT OF RANKING MEMBER BONNIE WATSON COLEMAN

SEPTEMBER 22, 2016 

Last week, we honored those who lost their lives on September 11, 2001. Fifteen 

years after these horrific attacks, we recognize that the terrorist threat to the 

United States has evolved. 

No longer do terrorists have to travel overseas for training or be directed by a 

leader of a terrorist organization in order to cause harm to the United States. 

As we have seen from the terrorist attacks in Orlando and in Charleston, and 

quite possibly the attacks in Minnesota and New York, terrorist attacks in the 

10 

United States can be lone actors, inspired by a particular ideology. This ideology can 

be espoused on the internet or in public forums. 

Additionally, propaganda including political discussions—such as the name of this 

hearing—that provide a misnomer to the threat also add to the rhetoric that can 

inspire a lone actor. Inflammatory rhetoric such as the suggestion that the United 

States should ban or surveil certain populations also fuel terrorist groups. 

I caution those with public platforms to be more mindful when addressing the 

threat. This is not a matter of being politically correct. This is recognizing that our 

words resonate beyond these four walls. 

The words we say reach terrorists—both foreign and domestic inspired. Even 

though we have complicated the situation by debating about labels, the Federal 

Government, including the Department of Homeland Security, has renewed its focus 

on countering violent extremism. 

While the administration states that countering violent extremism is a whole-ofGovernment approach, DHS is seemingly a Federal Government leader for countering violent extremism. 

Our witness today is the chair of the countering violent extremism task force. 

Also, last year, DHS created the Office for Community Partnerships and recently 

established the fiscal year 2016 CVE grant program. These programs were designed 

to develop and expand efforts to counter violent extremist activity. 

However, while Congress has appropriated funds for these efforts, there has been 

no CVE strategy issued by the Department and there has been no implementation 

plan of this strategy submitted to Congress. 

I look forward to hearing from you, Mr. Selim, a specific CVE strategy that will 

be implemented and I look forward to you resolving the lack of transparency behind 

the Department’s CVE programs. 

Protecting the American people from terrorist threats is the reason the Department of Homeland Security was created. Therefore, it is imperative that the Department and Congress look at the threat picture as a whole. 

I look forward to hearing from today’s witnesses informed perspectives on the 

threat this country is facing and the ways in which not only DHS, but also the Federal Government as a whole, can counter violent extremism. 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair thanks the gentlewoman. 

The Chair recognizes the gentleman, Mr. Thompson, the Ranking 

Member. 

Mr. THOMPSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I thank you for 

holding today’s hearing. I would also like to thank this witness and 

the other witnesses for their testimony they will offer. I join the 

Ranking Member in thanking the New Jersey authorities that apprehended the suspected New York and New Jersey bomber on 

Monday. 

Today we are hearing from the Department of Homeland Security and a private-sector panel on the Federal Government’s effort 

to counter violent extremism. The threat from violent extremism 

has changed since September 11. Terrorists do not have to travel 

overseas to receive training. As we saw in the deadliest attack on 

U.S. soil since 9/11 in Orlando this past June, the terrorists are 

acting alone, outside of large cells. 

Terrorists do not have to be directed by any one leader and do 

not have to be affiliated with any particular group. Terrorists are 

now being inspired by social media or other public platforms including political discourse. While top counterterrorism officials 

have stated that un-American policies, such as profiling and exclusion play into the hands of terrorists, people with public platforms 

still continue to use this rhetoric. 

For example, there is a Presidential nominee who has chosen to 

call 11 million people rapists and murderers and proposed cold war 

ideological tests on Muslim visitors to this country. We have Members of Congress who suggested that we should profile entire communities. 

11 

In fact, just yesterday in this very room, we had a Member make 

a comparison of a gifted student’s engineering project to the bombs 

that were built by the perpetrator in New York and New Jersey. 

While we put a continued focus on one community and debate titles 

and names, we still willingly neglect the current threat picture. 

Yesterday, we also heard from the well-respected heads of police 

departments from across the Nation. They told us that foreign terrorist organizations pose a threat to their communities. But their 

officers also live with the threat from sovereign citizens and other 

right and left wing groups. 

Our witnesses agreed that the wide-spread proliferation of guns 

into the hands of terrorists, inspired by foreign and domestic extremists, haunt law enforcement every day. 

This was not the committee’s first time hearing that guns were 

adding complexities to the current threat picture. Secretary Johnson testified that in order for Homeland Security to improve there 

must be sensible gun laws. Even though we just have had testimony from the Secretary of Homeland Security and police on the 

front lines about the need for gun reform, the Republican majority 

continues to block legislation to keep guns out of the hands of terrorists. 

Knowing that the threat landscape has changed, the Department 

of Homeland Security renewed its focus countering violent extremism. In September 2015, DHS established the Office of Community Partnerships to further the Department’s CVE efforts. DHS 

also chairs the administration’s CVE task force, which places the 

agency at the front of the administration’s CVE efforts. 

While the Department has renewed its focus on countering violent extremism and is a part of this task force, DHS, which stated 

that there was a Department-wide CVE strategy in formation, still 

has not sent this strategy or implementation plan to Congress. 

Hopefully today, Mr. Selim can give this subcommittee a date 

that the DHS CVE strategy and implementation plan will be submitted to Congress. Furthermore, even though the Department has 

this new office that is supposed to counter violent extremism of all 

types, its testimony contains short-sighted examples. 

Foreign terrorist organizations are mentioned approximately 20 

times throughout the Department’s testimony. The Department 

does not articulate any activity in which it engages to counter violent extremism from domestic movements. 

I can say that I am not shocked. However, as an agency whose 

mission is to secure the Nation from the threats we face, I will say 

that having such a myopic approach to countering violent extremism is a disservice to the American people. 

Today I anticipate a robust discussion and hope that both our 

Members and witnesses will respectively engage in a constructive 

dialog that will inform our counter violent extremism policies and 

efforts going forward. With that, I yield back. 

[The statement of Ranking Member Thompson follows:] 

12 

STATEMENT OF RANKING MEMBER BENNIE G. THOMPSON

SEPTEMBER 22, 2016 

Today, we are hearing from the Department of Homeland Security and a privatesector panel on the Federal Government’s efforts to Counter Violent Extremism. The 

threat from violent extremism has changed since September 11. 

Terrorists do not have to travel overseas to receive training. As we saw in the 

deadliest terror attack on U.S. soil since 9/11, in Orlando this past June, the terrorists are acting alone, outside of large cells. Terrorists do not have to be directed by 

any one leader and do not have to be affiliated with any particular group. Terrorists 

are now being inspired by social media and other public platforms, including political discourse. 

While top counterterrorism officials have stated that un-American policies such as 

profiling and exclusion play into the hands of terrorists, people with public platforms still continue to use this rhetoric. For example, there is a Presidential nominee who has chosen to call 11 million people rapists and murders and proposes Cold 

War ideological tests on Muslim visitors to this country. We have Members of Congress who suggest that we should profile entire communities. In fact, just yesterday 

in this very room, we had a Member make a comparison of a gifted student’s engineering project to the bombs that were built by the perpetrator in New York and 

New Jersey. 

And while we put a continued focus on one community and debate titles and 

names, we still willingly neglect the current threat picture. Yesterday, we also 

heard from well-respected heads of police departments from across this Nation. 

They told us that foreign terrorist organizations pose a threat to their communities, 

but their officers also live with the threat from sovereign citizens and other rightand left-wing groups. 

Our witnesses agreed that the wide-spread proliferation of guns into the hands 

of terrorists inspired by foreign and domestic extremists haunts law enforcement 

every day. This was not the Committee’s first time hearing that guns were adding 

complexities to the current threat picture. Secretary Johnson testified that in order 

for homeland security to improve there must be sensible gun laws. 

Even though we have testimony from the Secretary of Homeland Security and police on the front lines about the need for gun reform, the Republican majority continues to block legislation to keep guns out of the hands of terrorists. 

Knowing that the threat landscape has changed, the Department of Homeland Security renewed its focus countering violent extremism. In September 2015, DHS established the Office of Community Partnerships to further the Department’s CVE 

efforts. DHS also chairs the administration’s CVE task force, which places the agency at the forefront of the administration’s CVE efforts. While the Department has 

renewed its focus on countering violent extremism and is a part of this task force, 

DHS—which stated that there was a Department-wide CVE strategy in formation— 

still has not sent this strategy or implementation plan to Congress. 

Hopefully, today, Mr. Selim can give this subcommittee a date that the DHS CVE 

strategy and implementation plan will be submitted to Congress. 

Furthermore, even though the Department has this new office that is supposed 

to counter violent extremism of all types, its testimony today contains short-sighted 

examples. 

Foreign terrorist organizations are mentioned approximately 20 times throughout 

the Department’s testimony. The Department does not articulate any activity in 

which it engages to counter violent extremism from domestic movements. 

I can say that I am not shocked; however, as the agency whose mission is to secure the Nation from the threats we face, I will say that having such a myopic approach to countering violent extremism is a disservice to the American public. 

Today, I anticipate a robust discussion and hope that both our Members and witnesses will respectfully engage in a constructive dialogue that will inform our countering violent extremism policies and efforts going forward. 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair thanks the Ranking Member. Other Members of the subcommittee are reminded that opening statements 

may be submitted for the record. 

We are pleased to have two panels of distinguished witnesses before us today. The witnesses’ entire written statements will appear 

in the record. 

The Chair will introduce the first panel and then recognize you 

for your testimony. Our first panel, Mr. George Selim is the direcVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00016 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
13 

tor of the Office of Community Partnerships at the Department of 

Homeland Security. Mr. Selim also leads the interagency Countering Violent Extremism or CVE Taskforce intended to integrate 

and synchronize Federal efforts on this issue. Previously, he served 

for 4 years as the White House’s director of community partnerships on the National Security Council. 

Prior to his work at the White House, Mr. Selim was a senior 

policy advisor in the Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties at the 

Department of Homeland Security. He is also a commissioned officer in the U.S. Navy Reserve, and I thank you for your service, sir. 

Thank you for being here today. 

The Chair now recognizes Mr. Selim for your opening statement. 

STATEMENT OF GEORGE SELIM, DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIPS, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND 

SECURITY 

Mr. SELIM. Thank you, Chairman Perry. Good morning, Ranking 

Member Watson Coleman, Ranking Member Thompson, and distinguished Members of the subcommittee for the opportunity to testify 

today. Let me also start out by acknowledging the outstanding 

work of the first responders, law enforcement, and intelligence professionals both in the New York-New Jersey area and in the State 

of Minnesota for their heroic work over the course of the past several days. 

I welcome the opportunity to appear before you to discuss priorities and key actions of the Department of Homeland Security to 

counter violent extremism. I have considerable personal and professional equities in protecting our homeland, as the Chairman kindly 

laid out. 

By way of background, I have spent over a decade as a civil servant at the Department of Homeland Security. I have also served at 

the Department of Justice and at the National Security Council 

staff at the White House. In addition, I am a commissioned officer 

in the United States Navy Reserve and view the call to public service as one of the greatest honors our country offers all people regardless of race, religion, or National origin. 

In recent years, the threat of violent extremism has evolved. The 

types of attacks we have seen at home and abroad are not just terrorist-directed attacks, but they are also terrorist-inspired attacks, 

as ISIL and other extremist groups are turning to the internet to 

inspire lone offenders. 

By their nature, attacks involving self-radicalized individuals or 

lone offenders are harder for intelligence and law enforcement professionals to detect, and they can occur with little or no notice. The 

attacks in San Bernardino, Orlando and, most recently in New 

York, New Jersey, and Minnesota highlight both the urgency and 

severity of the threat that we face today. 

So what are we doing about it? The evolving threat posed by 

home-grown violent extremism requires going beyond the traditional counterterrorism approach and focusing not just on mitigation, but also on preventing and intervening in the process of 

radicalization. This prevention framework that I have just mentioned is known to many as countering violent extremism or CVE. 

14 

As was noted earlier, in September 2015, Secretary Johnson announced the creation of the office that I am honored to lead, the 

Office for Community Partnerships within DHS. This office is the 

focus of our Department’s efforts to counter violent extremism and 

works to build effective partnerships with communities across the 

country for this purpose. 

Our CVE efforts depend on working in a unified and cohesive 

manner across the U.S. Government. That is why we have established the CVE task force, currently headquartered at DHS, to organize all our CVE efforts across the domestic spectrum. 

This new task force could not have been possible without the 

strong partnership from the Department of Justice, who have appointed my deputy director and several key staff to this interagency body. 

A unified effort is necessary given the threat environment we 

face today. Terrorist groups, such as ISIL, have undertaken a deliberate strategy of using social media to reach individuals susceptible to their message and recruit and radicalize them to violence. 

The Office for Community Partnerships and the CVE taskforce depend on a range of stakeholder partners to reach individuals before 

they can be radicalized. 

Our partners in Federal, State, and local governments, along 

with law enforcement, civic and faith leaders, educators, social 

service organizations, mental health providers, and the private sector are essential to a unified mission set. Our efforts are Federallydriven, but they are locally-focused. 

Our CVE efforts aim to counter the types of ideological recruitment we have seen in recent years, focusing on potential root 

causes and drivers and working to provide off-ramps for individuals 

who may have taken steps toward embracing an ideology that advocates violence. 

At the same time, we remain consistent in rejecting the terrorist 

narrative that the West is in conflict with Islam, while denying 

ISIL, the religious legitimacy that they desperately seek as part of 

their broader effort to continually recruit and radicalize American 

citizens to violence. Our goal is to empower credible voices within 

communities that are targeted by violent extremists. 

Research has proven that young people, millennials, victims of 

terrorism, and community-based organizations are the most credible voices to discourage those in danger of being radicalized to violence, and our role in the Federal Government should be to give 

those partners the tools and resources they need to raise their own 

voices. 

Some of these tools can be provided by technology companies, 

and we are working with the private sector to encourage efforts to 

counter ISIL and other extremist groups on-line. One of these signature efforts that I have testified to before is titled the Peer-toPeer Challenging Extremism Competition, which I am happy to expand on. Our efforts to develop locally-driven prevention-based 

CVE frameworks, incorporate both on-line and in-person efforts. 

Thanks to the $10 million in CVE grant funding that Congress 

appropriated in the fiscal year 2016 omnibus appropriations act, we 

can continue to take this fight to the next level. On July 6 of this 

year, the Department formally issued the notice of funding opporVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00018 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
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tunity for fiscal year 2016 countering violent extremism grant program with $10 million in available funds. 

This is the first Federal assistance program devoted exclusively 

to providing local communities with the resources to counter violent extremism in the homelands. This grant program was developed by the DHS Office of Community Partnerships in partnership 

with our colleagues and partners at FEMA. The grant period just 

closed, and I am pleased to announce the results have been extraordinary. 

We received over 200 grant applications from over 42 States and territories. All told, we received over $100 million in grant applications. This is a tremendous indication of both the need and desire 

of State, local, and community-based partners to proactively engage 

in these efforts. This grant opportunity is an important part of our 

CVE work in building a comprehensive model that incorporates 

both cyber space and community space. 

As I have stated, events of the last week underscore just how urgent these issues remain and how critical our CVE efforts are in 

addressing some of our most critical challenges that we face today. 

Chairman and Ranking Member, thank you again for the opportunity to provide testimony today, and I look forward to working 

with you and your staffs on this issue. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Selim follows:] 

STATEMENT OF GEORGE SELIM

SEPTEMBER 22, 2016 

Chairman Perry, Ranking Member Watson Coleman, and distinguished Members 

of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to submit this written statement 

for the record. I welcome the opportunity to discuss priorities and key actions of the 

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to Counter Violent Extremism (CVE). 

OVERVIEW OF THREAT

In recent years, the threat of violent extremism has evolved. Terrorists at home 

and abroad are attempting to radicalize and recruit individuals to commit acts of 

violence within the United States. As Secretary Johnson has said, we are in a new 

phase in the global terrorist threat. 

DHS recognizes that the types of attacks we have seen at home and abroad are 

not just terrorist-directed attacks, but also terrorist-inspired attacks. These attacks 

are conducted by those who live among us in the homeland and become inspired 

and radicalized to violence by terrorist propaganda on the internet. We are concerned about attempts by ISIL and other terrorist groups to inspire lone offenders. 

For example, ISIL consistently releases high-quality English-language videos and 

magazines promoting its alleged caliphate and calling for supporters in the West to 

pursue attacks in their homelands. 

Terrorist-inspired attacks are often difficult to detect by our intelligence and lawenforcement communities. They can occur with little or no notice, and present a 

complex homeland security challenge. As ISIL continues to lose territory, it has increased its attacks and attempted attacks on targets outside of Iraq and Syria. We 

were forcefully reminded of this on the morning of June 12, 2016 when over 300 

individuals were terrorized in an Orlando night club by a man who shot and killed 

49 individuals and injured 53 more. We believe he may have been inspired, in part, 

by terrorist organizations overseas, resulting in the worst mass shooting in U.S. history. Further, the events just last weekend in New York, New Jersey, and Minnesota underscore the urgency of this issue. 

The current threat environment requires us to build on conventional approaches 

to counterterrorism. Countering violent extremism (CVE) has become a key focus of 

DHS’s work to secure the homeland. Al-Qaeda and ISIL continue to target MuslimAmerican communities in our country to recruit and inspire individuals to commit 

acts of violence. Well-informed families and communities are our best defense 

against terrorist ideologies, which represent the current threat from ISIL’s propaVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00019 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
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ganda. Within this context, working with communities to prevent radicalization to 

violence has become imperative. Muslims are undoubtedly the group most directly 

targeted by ISIL overseas. In the United States, they may also be best placed to 

identify potential indicators of ISIL-inspired attacks. 

We also know that plots inspired by ISIL and al-Qaeda are not the only violent 

extremist threats we face. These threats come from a range of groups and individuals, including domestic terrorists. Individuals inspired by ISIL and al-Qaeda continue to pose the most immediate threat, as the attacks in San Bernardino and Orlando have demonstrated, but events in Charleston, Dallas, and Oak Creek illustrate that there are a range of behaviors and motivations that can lead to violent 

extremism domestically. As we tragically experienced 15 years ago with the terrorist 

attacks on 9/11, a failure to adapt to an evolving threat can have devastating consequences, and we want to ensure that we are focused on the full landscape of the 

violent extremist spectrum. 

The DHS Office for Community Partnerships (OCP) was set up to further our domestic CVE efforts and provide support to communities, State and local partners, 

and civic organizations who are actively seeking tools and resources to protect their 

communities. Since 9/11, we have seen time and time again that Federal efforts to 

counter violent extremism will only be successful with the trust of local communities 

and stakeholders. 

TAKING OUR CVE EFFORTS TO THE NEXT LEVEL

When Secretary Johnson announced an Office for Community Partnerships in 

2015, he instructed me to focus the Department’s efforts on countering violent extremism and work to build relationships and promote trust with local communities 

across the United States. 

OCP’s mission includes efforts to support and enhance efforts by key stakeholders 

to prevent and counter radicalization and recruitment to violence. The Office 

leverages the resources and relationships of the Department and applies the personal leadership of the Secretary and senior officials to empower leaders in both the 

public and private sectors by raising awareness of the threat of violent extremism. 

We are focused on partnering with and empowering communities by providing 

them a wide range of resources to counter violent extremism. In addition, we are 

partnering with the private sector to find innovative, community-based approaches 

to countering violent extremism on social media. Key stakeholders and partners 

working with OCP include the private sector, civil society, and local law enforcement. Influential community leaders such as religious leaders, city councils and 

local non-governmental organizations (NGOs) work directly with OCP field staff in 

identifying community priority issues, conducting CVE community exercises, and 

addressing concerns at community engagement roundtables in partnership with the 

DHS Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties. OCP also works with local, State, 

and Federal law enforcement by providing training, exercises, and technical assistance. 

Advancing that effort also means working in a unified and coordinated way across 

the U.S. Government, which is the purpose of the interagency CVE Task Force announced in January 2016. The Task Force is hosted and currently led by DHS, and 

the leadership will rotate every 2 years between a DHS and a Department of Justice 

(DOJ) executive. The Task Force includes participation from over 10 departments 

and agencies across the Federal Government. 

The mission of the Task Force is to organize CVE efforts across the Federal Government and coordinate a whole-of-Government approach to empower local partners 

to prevent violent extremism in the United States. Specifically, its major objectives 

include coordinating and prioritizing Federal CVE research and establishing feedback mechanisms to increase the relevance of CVE findings; synchronizing Federal 

CVE outreach and engagement; managing CVE communications and leveraging digital technologies to engage, empower, and connect CVE stakeholders; and supporting the development of intervention programs. Ensuring that the Nation’s CVE 

efforts are sufficiently resourced as described in the President’s fiscal year 2017 

budget has been an integral part of our overall efforts. 

INTERNATIONAL EFFORTS

Internationally, DHS regularly exchanges best practices and works to enhance our 

understanding of regional threat variation through multilateral and bilateral engagements. Robust international engagements enhance our understanding of the 

challenges posed by radicalization to violence and provide useful mechanisms for developing new approaches for addressing these challenges. Moving forward, we will 

17 

1 https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2016/06/14/remarks-president-after-counterisil-meeting. 

pursue efforts to share promising practices and research among many countries to 

enhance our understanding and build a stronger evidence base. 

In addition to our international partnerships, OCP also works closely with the 

State Department’s Global Engagement Center (GEC). The Task Force leadership 

and GEC leadership regularly meet to discuss a range of CVE issues. In addition, 

the GEC director and I have open lines of communication, as do a number of their 

key personnel with OCP and Task Force staff. DHS also has a full-time detailee to 

the GEC who regularly reports to and meets with Task Force personnel. Finally, 

the Task Force receives GEC guidance on messaging opportunities as well as ongoing strategic guidance on themes used by the Global Coalition to Counter ISIL, 

which are then disseminated to a range of key stakeholders as appropriate. 

We also work closely with other Department of State offices on CVE-related 

issues. The Task Force works closely with the CT/CVE Bureau and the Department 

of State’s CVE director. 

WORKING TO DE-LEGITIMIZE ISIL

As the President recently noted after a counter-ISIL meeting with members of the 

National Security Council, ‘‘Groups like ISIL and al-Qaeda want to make this war 

a war between Islam and America, or between Islam and the West. They want to 

claim that they are the true leaders of over a billion Muslims around the world who 

reject their crazy notions. They want us to validate them by implying that they 

speak for those billion-plus people; that they speak for Islam. That’s their propaganda. That’s how they recruit. And if we fall into the trap of painting all Muslims 

with a broad brush and imply that we are at war with an entire religion—then 

we’re doing the terrorists’ work for them.’’1

Within this context, the Department and the administration continue to reject the 

terrorist narrative that the West and Islam are in conflict, as well as the notion that 

terrorists like ISIL genuinely represent Islam. To be successful in our homeland security efforts, we have to underscore and reinforce the fact that ISIL does not represent Islam and cannot justify its barbaric terrorism with twisted interpretations 

of one of the world’s most prominent religions. 

The President has also noted that Muslim-American communities have a role to 

play in helping counter these narratives and addressing the perversion of Islam, but 

it is not the role of those who practice one faith alone. Every community has a role 

to play in active citizenry. While we do so, our civil rights and civil liberties must 

also be upheld. Ultimately, our CVE efforts will only be successful with the participation of all community leaders. 

COUNTERING ON-LINE RECRUITMENT AND RADICALIZATION TO VIOLENCE

As terrorist groups such as ISIL continue to undertake a deliberate strategy of 

using social media to reach into our country and recruit, radicalize, and mobilize 

individuals to violence, the private sector’s efforts on this issue have become critical. 

As part of supporting efforts to counter terrorist messaging and recruitment online, the Department supports the Peer-To-Peer (P2P): Challenging Extremism contests. Launched in 2005, P2P is a Government-sponsored competition to empower 

students at universities to develop innovative and powerful social media campaigns 

that include positive, alternative, or counter narratives to challenge violent extremism. Student teams work with a faculty advisor while earning academic credit to 

research, design, and launch social media campaigns that have a measurable impact 

on their campus, community, and country. 

Since its inception in spring 2015, more than 3,000 students representing 125 university teams from more than 30 countries have participated in this unique program. In fall 2016, DHS is supporting 50 teams at U.S. colleges and universities, 

and DHS remains committed to working with partners across the Government to 

scale up these domestic student-designed campaigns and projects. 

Facebook became the first technology partner to join the P2P project in the summer of 2015. As part of the partnership, Facebook sponsors a competition of the top 

3 teams who demonstrate the best integration of Facebook into their broader digital 

and social media campaigns at the Facebook Global Digital Challenge event. 

Facebook also provides advertisement credits on their platform to each of the teams 

(domestic and international) during the competition. Facebook’s participation has 

also allowed the initiative to expand to more than one hundred international teams 

in fall 2016. 

18 

Through the P2P program, we have seen that young people are essential to our 

work in creating credible and positive messages that counter violent extremism. 

That is why, for example, DHS is currently working with partners across the Government to scale up domestic student-designed campaigns and projects. This will require support from Government, non-Government organizations, and private-sector 

partners to transition viable student projects to market. 

At the Department, we are aware that there is a limit to the effectiveness of Government efforts with regard to countering terrorist recruitment and radicalization 

to violence, particularly on-line. Local communities are best positioned to intervene, 

and they must address these issues with both on-line and off-line solutions. We at 

DHS can act as a facilitator, connector, and convener, but ultimately, communities 

and individuals are best positioned to take action to counter violent extremism. 

In addition to supporting the P2P program, the Task Force includes a team dedicated to communications and digital strategy. The Task Force builds partnerships 

with the private sector to identify and amplify credible voices to counter narratives 

promoted by ISIL, domestic terrorists, and other violent extremists. This includes 

a multi-platform communications strategy that leverages the use of digital technologies to engage, empower, and connect CVE stakeholders. 

Ultimately, the Department believes that the innovative private sector that created so many technologies our society enjoys today can also help create tools to limit 

terrorists from using these technologies for terrorist recruitment and radicalization 

to violence. We applaud and are encouraged by the private sector’s increasing efforts 

to address the fraction of their users exploiting their technologies for nefarious ends. 

In addition, we recognize the critical role that the private sector and NGOs can play 

in continuing their efforts to develop creative and effective solutions to counter how 

terrorists use media platforms for these purposes. Going forward, we will continue 

to convene a wide range of disciplines, including civil society, technology companies, 

and content producers. We are encouraged by a number of initiatives underway and 

applaud those who see the common challenge terrorism poses and are continuing 

to take proactive steps to make it harder for terrorists to operate. 

DHS CVE GRANTS PROGRAM

In December 2015, Congress appropriated CVE funds in the fiscal year 2016 Omnibus Appropriations Act, which allocated $10 million in CVE grant funding to be 

administered jointly by OCP and FEMA. This is the first time Federal funding at 

this level will be provided, on a competitive basis, specifically to support local CVE 

programming. And it is the first Federal assistance program devoted exclusively to 

providing local communities with the resources to counter violent extremism in the 

homeland. The funding will be competitively awarded to State, Tribal, territorial, 

and local governments, nonprofit organizations, and institutions of higher education 

to support new and existing community-based efforts to counter violent extremist 

recruitment and radicalization to violence. 

The Department formally issued a notice of funding opportunity on July 6, 2016, 

announcing the new Countering Violent Extremism Grant Program. Applications 

were due September 6, and the response has been extraordinary. We received over 

200 applications from 42 States, territories, and Washington, DC. Applications are 

from a broad array of applicants: Local and State governments; regional coalitions 

of governments, both law enforcement and non-law enforcement; universities and 

non-profits with a broad spectrum of missions, including peace and diplomacy, civic 

engagement, refugee services, and mental health services; and institutions with religious affiliations, including multiple faiths and interfaith organizations. As of today, 

the anticipated award date will be no later than December 1, 2016. 

MOVING FORWARD

Our efforts to develop a locally-driven, comprehensive, prevention-based CVE 

framework remain on-going. We have taken great strides over recent months to professionalize and institutionalize the CVE infrastructure of the Department and the 

U.S. Government as a whole. However, more work remains. 

Preventing future recruits to terrorism has become more important than ever. A 

generation ago, individuals may have been radicalized to violence by someone they 

knew in person over the course of several years; now, while that still takes place, 

it is far more common for individuals to be radicalized to violence on-line. One example of the older model in transition is Zachary Chesser, a Virginia native who 

pled guilty to supporting terrorists overseas and crimes of violence. He was a typical 

suburban Virginia youth: Growing up, he was a good student and a soccer fan. He 

19 

2 https://www.hsgac.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/CHESSER%20FINAL%20REPORT.pdf. 

radicalized to violence between 2008 and 2010, integrating on-line violent extremist 

material with in-person relationships, and the exchange of formal letters.2

By contrast, we now see individuals recruited to fight for ISIL based on information obtained exclusively on-line. ISIL’s deft use of the internet, together with the 

wide availability of its messaging, has broadened the population of potentially vulnerable individuals and shortened the time span of their recruitment. 

CONCLUSION

The recent events in San Bernardino, Orlando, and most recently in New York, 

New Jersey, and Minnesota highlight the urgency and severity of this threat. As 

such, the CVE efforts undertaken by both the Department and the CVE Task Force 

are paramount to address one of the most significant homeland security challenges 

facing the Nation. 

This is the vision we are working to implement today, through the important 

work of building a comprehensive CVE model that ensures safe and resilient communities in the homeland. Thank you again for the opportunity to address this critical issue. 

Mr. PERRY. Thank you, Mr. Selim. 

The Chair now recognizes himself for questioning. As we discussed before the hearing, you and I, we do have a common enemy. 

We in Congress, many Americans, certainly the peaceful Muslim 

community, many of us remain frustrated with this disconnect of 

verbiage. 

With that, earlier this month, the Secretary himself spoke at 

ISNA, their annual convention, a group that has been named in 

the Holy Land Foundation investigation trial, the largest terror financing trial in American history, as their keynote speaker. I don’t 

know how else to put it, but let me ask you this question. 

How can we as Members of Congress and as citizens be sure that 

the Department is not using some of this grant money, some of this 

$10 million and sending that hard-earned tax money to questionable organizations such as ISNA or anybody else? How can we be 

assured of that? 

Mr. SELIM. Thank you, Chairman, for that question. Let me start 

out by saying I was with the Secretary at that event and I have 

personally attended the Islamic Society of North America convention for many years. It is one of the largest platforms to conduct 

outreach and interact with the American Muslim community. 

There are over 20,000 attendees. 

I am happy to share a version of the remarks that the Secretary 

delivered there, and by way of background, he was the first-ever 

Cabinet official to address that audience. His message was widely 

well-received by those who participated. 

In specific regard to your question on ensuring that the grant 

funding is appropriately awarded, you know, we have taken painstaking measures, as is outlined in our notice of funding opportunity, to ensure a rigorous review and evaluation and awarding 

process for ensuring that any award that the Department is considering making goes through a thorough and adequate review. 

Mr. PERRY. So but by way of answering the question it kind-of 

leads to more questions about that, and specifically does that 

mean—you have attended. It was a great event. It is a great organization. It is big, et cetera. 

20 

Does that mean that ISNA, once again an unindicted co-conspirator in the largest terror financing trial and finding in American history, could they receive some of this grant money? 

Mr. SELIM. The Islamic Society of North America is as a, if they 

are a 501(c)3, I think they are, I have never actually reviewed their 

paperwork status. If they are 501(c)3, under the rules of the notice 

of funding application, they are eligible to apply for a grant in this 

program. 

Mr. PERRY. I understand they are eligible to apply. Would they 

be able—would you grant them the funds? Is there any prohibition 

to someone that is involved in terror financing from receiving hardearned taxpayer funds? 

Mr. SELIM. I am not aware of any list in the U.S. Government 

of any 501(c)3s that are prohibited from applying for a Federal 

grant. 

Mr. PERRY. So there are no barred individuals or organizations 

as you currently know, for any reason? 

Mr. SELIM. Not just the DHS program, from any Federal grant 

program. 

Mr. PERRY. But we are talking about National security, and we 

are talking about known affiliates of terrorist organizations and 

terror financing. So that is what—I am trying to be particular. I 

understand maybe somebody else does it, but we are not necessarily concerned about who builds a sidewalk or beautification, or 

what have you. 

Mr. SELIM. Sure. 

Mr. PERRY. That has nothing to do with National security. But 

this does have National security implications. So there is no known 

prohibition at this time to any organizations that might be involved 

in terror or terror financing from receiving these taxpayer dollars? 

Mr. SELIM. What I can assure you, Mr. Chairman, is that there 

is a high degree of scrutiny and review for every grant applicant 

whether that be a Muslim-affiliated organization or non-Muslim-affiliated organization. Each and every grant application that we receive has four degrees of review that it goes through. 

Mr. PERRY. I appreciate that. But the fact remains there is no 

prohibition, right? Is that what we have established? 

Mr. SELIM. I am not aware of any—— 

Mr. PERRY. You are not aware of any at least. OK, great. So 

what are your metrics to gauge effectiveness? I went through your 

testimony, the long form, the long, so to speak, portion of it, and 

I have a hard time putting together how we start and how we finish. 

You know, it seems like—I hate to say it, but a lot of mumbojumbo to me. So what are the metrics? How do you determine 

whether you are successful? What are we getting as taxpayers for 

our $10 million, and how do you determine whether it is working 

or not? 

Mr. SELIM. Thank you for that question. So part of the metrics 

are evaluated on an application-by-application, on a program-byprogram basis. Each and every application has a different set of 

metrics. 

On page 26 of the notice of funding opportunity we lay out, we 

lay out 10 clear criteria that each and program must apply and 

21 

must meet to even be considered for a potential award. That includes a range of different factors, which I am happy to go over in 

much more detail later, that has measures of effectiveness, performance measures—— 

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Selim, can you give us a couple examples? My 

time has expired. I just want to get an idea of what are some of 

those examples of the metric? 

Mr. SELIM. Sure, so in the categories of potential applications 

that we have for training, countering extremist narratives, and a 

range of other issues, you know, a successful application would be 

implementing a campaign to counter extremist narratives on-line, 

developing and implementing a training or education program for 

State and local law enforcement, community—— 

Mr. PERRY. But you understand that is the input. So yes, they 

do that. let’s say they put a great campaign together for on-line advertising or whatever. 

Mr. SELIM. Sure. 

Mr. PERRY. How do you gauge, what is the deliverable? How do 

you gauge whether it was successful? Whether it lowered the incidence of radicalization or whatever the goal is. How do you gauge 

that? 

Mr. SELIM. So specifically for on-line campaigns, there are three 

kind-of core metrics for any kind of on-line campaign. There is the 

reach, there is the kind of effect, and there is the measurement of 

did we make a particular, you know, set of individuals who clicked 

on a particular program and engaged in it in a certain way. We got 

them to take some type of measure to implement a training curriculum at their school, at their house of worship, at their community-based organization or others, you know. But many—— 

Mr. PERRY. My time has expired. I appreciate it, but I want to 

be respectful. Thank you, sir. 

Mr. SELIM. Thank you. 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair now recognizes the Ranking Member, Mrs. 

Watson Coleman for her questioning. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think I need 

to agree that I am somewhat confused about whether or not you 

are operating, Mr. Selim, with a strategy and with an implementation strategy. I don’t quite understand the criteria that is being 

used when you put out the request for the grants and what you 

will be looking into. So you have been in operation for 1 year, 

right? 

Mr. SELIM. Just under, yes, ma’am. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. During that year, have you done anything outside of the agency other than putting the agency together, 

putting together sort-of the flow of work, who is responsible for 

what? 

Mr. SELIM. Yes, ma’am. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Have you—OK. So you have worked with 

outside agencies as Office of Partnerships? 

Mr. SELIM. Yes, ma’am. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. OK. So who are you working with and 

what are you doing? 

Mr. SELIM. OK, so I will allow two specific examples, if I may? 

In my role as the director of the CVE task force, we have over 10 

22 

Federal departments and agencies who are part of that effort. My 

role as the director of the Office of Community Partnerships, in addition to rolling out one of the fastest grant programs in the history 

of Federal grant programs in less than 6 months, we created and 

implemented this CVE grant program. We have conducted a range 

of other outreach and engagement opportunities in probably over a 

dozen States across the country. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. So I want to know, specifically, under 

this Office of Community Partnerships, what are you doing out 

there in the community? With whom are you doing these things? 

Mr. SELIM. Two core focus areas. The first area on our Office of 

Community Partnerships in DHS is to build bridges with a range 

of communities that may be targeted for violent extremist 

radicalization. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. OK, let’s start with that. Who are you 

dealing with that, under that sort-of core issue, building bridges 

and developing relationships in communities? 

Mr. SELIM. Sure. So I have three core sets of stakeholders. One 

set of stakeholders is State and local law enforcement across the 

country. Another set of stakeholders is municipal officials, mayors, 

county council members. A third set of stakeholders, they are NGO, 

advocacy organization leaders, not-for-profits and so on. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Talk to me about the community organizations that you are engaged with. Name some and where they are 

located and what you do with them. 

Mr. SELIM. So two of the members of my office, two of my employees are located outside of Washington, DC. One of them is located and works every day in Los Angeles and the other one works 

in Denver. 

So my staff, who work in Los Angeles for example, on any given 

day engage with the mayor’s office, engage with Los Angeles Police 

Department, the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department, and a range of 

other advocacy organizations. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Yes. I can find out the government stuff. 

Mr. SELIM. OK. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. I want to know about the non-government stuff, the lifting up of communities, the developing relationships with communities, helping communities to understand the 

threats that exist there. What are these communities? Are they all 

Muslim communities? 

Mr. SELIM. No. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Are you doing the same thing for nonMuslim communities? Where are you doing the work and specifically with whom? 

Mr. SELIM. Yes, I—— 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Other than the governments, not the municipal government, not the county government, not the State government. But the NGO’s and the community programs that supposedly exist that you are trying to access to be part of this countering violent extremism effort. 

Mr. SELIM. So many of the NGO’s that we work with across the 

country are, in fact, Muslim or Muslim-affiliated NGO’s, however 

not exclusively. 

23 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. All right. OK. Tell me some that you 

work with that are not. 

Mr. SELIM. OK, for example, my staff that work in Denver and 

service the entire State of Colorado, work with a range of different 

NGO’s who are engaged in countering domestic terrorism of all different forms. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Name them. 

Mr. SELIM. I don’t have that list on me my right now, but I am 

happy to provide that for you. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. OK, tell me this. 

Mr. SELIM. There is no secret to the organization. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. How many NGO’s do you work with and 

what percentage of those NGO’s are Muslim-focused or Muslim organizations and how many are not? 

Mr. SELIM. I think the—— 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Do you have that information? 

Mr. SELIM. I don’t have it off-hand, but I would offer, Congresswoman, that at the end of this grant application period, as I mentioned, we conducted a fair amount of outreach for this grant solicitation. At the end of this grant application period, I am happy to 

work with you and your staff to make all the NGO’s and staffs that 

applied for this grant known to you so that we can look at the percentages by breakdown. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. So you received over 200 applications? 

Mr. SELIM. Correct. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. What percentages of those applications 

did you receive that were addressed to domestic violence, counter 

violence? Do you have any idea? 

Mr. SELIM. Ma’am, the grant application closed on September 6, 

I don’t have that level of detail breakdown with me today. But I 

am happy to supply it to you. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Do you have any idea? Give me, you 

know, 70 percent of them are from—— 

Mr. SELIM. I don’t off-hand. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. OK. 

Mr. SELIM. We received over 200 applications. I have not personally reviewed each one yet. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Do you all have any kind of strategy— 

and my time is just about up—do you have any kind of strategy 

or plan or implementation or whatever to look at the issue of countering violent extremism from the foreign-inspired, foreign-directed 

threat to the United States of America and the domestic threat? 

Mr. SELIM. Yes. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. OK. When are you going to deliver that 

to us so that we understand? 

Mr. SELIM. Thank you, and I wanted to address that point that 

you raised as well as Ranking Member Thompson, and I think that 

is a very important point. So as noted, you know, my office has 

been in creation for just under 12 months, and I don’t want to give 

the impression that it is without strategy or without implementation. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. So then we should be getting it rather 

soon as opposed to later. So give me some kind of a date, because 

you got $10 million that you are considering. 

24 

Mr. SELIM. Correct. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. That it ought to be associated with some 

kind of a strategy, that you ought to be looking at the whole issue 

from a holistic perspective—— 

Mr. SELIM. Correct. 

Mrs. WATSON COLEMAN. Not just focusing on one religious community, but a whole community in the United States of America 

that provides that kind of violent threat. Just tell me when will I 

get it? When will you send it to Congress? 

Mr. SELIM. I can assure you, Congresswoman, that I am committed to working on this issue with you and this committee. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. I appreciate that, and I am simply asking, you have been in business for a whole year. 

Mr. SELIM. Yes, ma’am. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. You are telling me that you are operating 

under some kind of strategy. 

Mr. SELIM. Yes, ma’am. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. When can we see it? 

Mr. SELIM. I don’t have a specific date that I can give you today, 

but I can tell you that I am a direct report to Secretary Johnson. 

I have clear direction from he and the Department leadership on 

how our office should be functioning and evaluating itself on a dayto-day basis. To the extent that I am able to quantify that in a 

strategic document to the extent that you are asking for one, I am 

working to deliver that to you as soon as possible. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. We are really concerned that there needs 

to be a rationale supported in evidence when you consider making 

grants with taxpayers’ money. That there are some metrics in 

place, that you will be able to evaluate what you are doing, why 

you are doing it, and the outcome. 

I yield back because I am a little bit over my time. Thank you, 

Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair thanks the gentlelady from New Jersey. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Georgia, Mr. 

Loudermilk. 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for 

being here today. This is actually on CSPAN this morning and this 

was a topic of conversation by many of the callers, because we have 

to take a strong look at terrorism from an objective standpoint and 

understand one thing. It is the individual that carries out an act 

of terrorism. 

Trucks don’t just arbitrarily run over people, knives don’t arbitrarily go through malls and stab people, hatchets just don’t jump 

up and attack law enforcement officers, planes don’t accidentally 

fly into buildings by themselves. Pressure cookers don’t automatically blow up, killing people. Pipe bombs just don’t place themselves in places. Gun stores just don’t erupt in gunfire. 

It is the individual. We have to focus on the individual. The one 

thing I do applaud is our effort to identify the reason that we are 

having an increase in terrorist activity as well as potential terrorist 

activities is the pure volume of individuals who are seeking to do 

harm to Americans. 

That is through people who are already radicalized coming in 

through various means into this Nation, whether it be through a 

25 

refugee program or an open border or whatever. There is a pure 

volume of people coming into this Nation seeking to do harm. 

The other aspect of that which, I think, is more difficult to grab 

hold of are American citizens being radicalized who do have some 

Constitutional protections, which make it harder on our law enforcement. I applaud you in trying to do that. 

My questions really evolve around how do we counter the 

radicalization process? What is the purpose of the—how do you actually do your job? Is the purpose intervention, to stop the 

radicalization process? Is it to identify those who are being 

radicalized, to put them on a watch list? How is it—what is the 

function of the office? How are you gonna carry this out? 

Mr. SELIM. Thank you for that question, Congressman. Three 

core areas I want to focus on to answer your question. When I reference in my oral statement attempting to prevent and intervene 

in the process of radicalization, that falls into one of three buckets 

of action. 

First is that we are gonna raise awareness on the nature and 

scope of radicalization and recruitment in the homeland so that 

State and local government, community faith leaders, municipal 

leaders and so on can recognize what those signs look like. It is not 

always inherent. 

The second bucket for DHS is to supply tools and resources to 

State, local, and community-based partners, whether it is a grant 

program, a community awareness briefing, a training exercise, a 

tabletop so that we can actually walk through what to look like and 

when to raise something to authorities and so on. 

Then the third category, which is the title of my office, the Office 

for Community Partnerships, is to build and sustain the long-term 

partnerships between municipal officials, Federal law enforcement, 

community-based leaders and so on, so that that type of dialog and 

interaction between a range of different sectors can be comprehensively applied. 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. So when you identify someone who is potentially being radicalized—and I really believe this is a local issue. 

It is no longer a Federal issue. The Federal Government is not very 

good at working in the local area. We gotta remove barriers to let 

the local law enforcement, local officials be engaged in this. I think 

the people trust their local governments, obviously, more than the 

Federal Government. 

Mr. SELIM. I completely agree, sir. 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. So what do you do when—all right. We see a 

young person that is in process of being radicalized. What do you 

do? That is what I am looking for. 

Mr. SELIM. So—— 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. What action are we taking at that point? 

Mr. SELIM. So this is the complexity around radicalization. It is 

not a black or white issue. It is not this person is definitely being 

radicalized. That is what makes some of those cases that we have 

seen in recent years so difficult for law enforcement and our intelligence agencies to detect. 

That is why we are supplying the specific information, training 

tools, and resources at the local level. I am in complete agreement 

with you that this must be a locally-led initiative. 

26 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. It has to go further because I think it would 

be a great gift to us if, let’s say, a parent—— 

Mr. SELIM. Yes. 

Mr. LOUDERMILK [continuing]. Would approach the FBI and say, 

‘‘My son is showing signs of radicalization’’ or ‘‘My son is a terrorist.’’ Would you agree? 

Mr. SELIM. I would absolutely agree. 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. Didn’t that just happen in New York City? 

Mr. SELIM. I am not sure of all the specifics of the case. I believe 

that the—— 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. I believe the parent came to the FBI and said, 

‘‘My son is a terrorist.’’ 

Mr. SELIM. Yes. 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. So what I am saying is, our intervention has 

to be better than it is today. We have to take that to the next level. 

I am in support of the efforts that we are trying to do. But do we 

have any evidence that intervention—have we had any successes in 

actually countering the radicalization process? 

Mr. SELIM. Congressman, I am in complete agreement with the 

facts as you have stated them. I would just offer that, in attempting to develop this path of countering violent extremism that I 

have laid out, the director of the FBI, the director of Homeland Security, and others have said numerous times we are not going to 

arrest our way out of this threat. 

We have to have a number of alternatives. That is what the CVE 

focus is, is getting community leaders, local officials, and so on to 

have early indications of the potential of radicalization and have 

options other than just call the FBI. 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. But do we have any success? Can you point to 

where countering the violent extremism has actually reversed a 

radicalization process or resulted in a stopping? 

Mr. SELIM. Yes, part of the difficult part of answering that question is you are really asking to measure a negative. 

But I know anecdotally in cities across the United States, young 

people who have witnessed some type of, who have exposure to violence or trauma and have a potential propensity to violence in 

some way, that has been raised up to school or religious or local 

law enforcement officials. They have been taken off that path. 

That has been happening anecdotally in a range of cities across 

the country. I can’t sit here before you today and definitively say 

that person was gonna commit an act of terrorism with a pressure 

cooker bomb. But we are developing that prevention framework in 

a range of cities across the country, and that is the focus of our 

plan. 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. I am looking for effectiveness, because quite 

often we build programs and it is a black hole of money to dump 

into. In the line of the questioning that the Chairman had, I do 

have concerns about NGO’s that we are going to partner in. Where 

is this money going to go? 

To follow up with some of the things he was getting to, who determines these guidelines for what organizations you would actually contract with or work with? Who makes that final decision? 

Mr. SELIM. Ultimately, sir, as laid out in the notice of funding 

opportunity, the Secretary of Homeland Security has final say. 

27 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. Do you have a list of folks you would not do 

work with? 

Mr. SELIM. As I noted earlier, sir, there is not in the Federal 

Government a list of NGO’s that are prohibited from applying for 

a Federal grant. 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. Do we know of NGO’s who are engaged in antiAmerican activities? 

Mr. SELIM. Do we have a list of NGO’s—— 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. Do we know of organizations out there that are 

engaged? 

Mr. SELIM. I would defer that question to the law enforcement 

agencies and intelligence partners. But I think there is a pretty 

keen understanding of—if there is an organization in the United 

States that is conducting any type of criminal or counterterrorism 

activity, I am fairly certain that is probably on the FBI’s radar. 

Mr. LOUDERMILK. So I would think that we do know of organizations who are engaged in anti-American activities, that we would 

want to have a list of those we definitely would not engage in. I 

apologize, Mr. Chairman. I have exceeded my time. 

Mr. SELIM. Thank you, Congressman. 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair thanks the gentleman. 

The Chair now recognizes the Ranking Member, Mr. Thompson. 

Mr. THOMPSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Kinda pursuing the 

line of questioning. Mr. Selim, you said that your effort is to develop a locally-driven, comprehensive, prevention-based CVE 

framework. Can you kinda explain how you can do that when you 

don’t have a strategy or implementation plan? 

Mr. SELIM. Yes, Ranking Member Thompson, thank you for that 

question. So a prevention framework in a particular metropolitan 

or geographic area in the United States, they all look very different. A prevention framework in a city like Boston looks very different than a prevention framework looks like in Los Angeles. 

What we are doing is we are applying—— 

Mr. THOMPSON. I understand. But you gotta have an overall 

framework to operate from. You can apply it to whatever community. But I am talking about a plan and a strategy. Do you have 

one? 

Mr. SELIM. We do. 

Mr. THOMPSON. Can you provide this committee, in writing, both 

the plan and strategy? 

Mr. SELIM. I am working diligently to get this committee, with 

the greatest amount of expediency I possibly can do to get you that 

plan. 

Mr. THOMPSON. So either you do or you don’t, now. Come on now. 

Mr. SELIM. I am sorry? 

Mr. THOMPSON. Do you have it? 

Mr. SELIM. We have a plan of direction. 

Mr. THOMPSON. And strategy? 

Mr. SELIM. Strategy. Yes. 

Mr. THOMPSON. Both? 

Mr. SELIM. We have a strategic plan—— 

Mr. THOMPSON. Don’t—— 

Mr. SELIM [continuing]. For countering violent extremism at the 

Department of Homeland Security. 

28 

Mr. THOMPSON. Look, look, I understand. But I am talking about 

your shop. 

Mr. SELIM. My office. 

Mr. THOMPSON. Yes, sir. 

Mr. SELIM. Yes, sir. 

Mr. THOMPSON. You had a plan and a strategy? 

Mr. SELIM. We do. We do. 

Mr. THOMPSON. When can we get it? 

Mr. SELIM. I will be happy to work with you and staff to get that 

as soon as possible. 

Mr. THOMPSON. Ah, no, now, I mean, if you have got it, send 

somebody, out for it right now. 

Mr. SELIM. I am not at liberty to do it at this very moment, 

but—— 

Mr. THOMPSON. Why? 

Mr. SELIM. Why? 

Mr. THOMPSON. Yes. 

Mr. SELIM. Because I am testifying in front of this committee. 

Mr. THOMPSON. Don’t be facetious, brother. Either the plan exists 

or it doesn’t. If it exists, then one of your aides you have out here— 

tell them go get the plan for the committee. Or can we get it this 

afternoon, in the morning or whenever? 

Mr. SELIM. Sir, by no means am I trying to get around providing 

this to the committee. What I am working to do and what I have 

been working to do for the past several weeks is ensure that the 

strategic plan that we provide this committee, including your staff, 

is up to the highest level of standards. Developing a plan that 

will—— 

Mr. THOMPSON. Wait now. I understand inside-the-Beltway talk. 

So just make it as plain and simple. When can we get the plan? 

Whether it is 50 percent complete—you told us it is ready. All I am 

trying to do is—— 

Mr. SELIM. Nearly ready. 

Mr. THOMPSON. Oh. It is nearly ready now. 

Mr. SELIM. Yes, sir. Ranking Member—— 

Mr. THOMPSON. I understand. Well, I am disappointed because— 

but we will go on. You talked about the balance that your shop is 

trying to do. Can you name me five NGO’s that you working with 

right now? 

Mr. SELIM. Five NGO’s that are conducting efforts to counter violent extremism in the United States? 

Mr. THOMPSON. That your office is working with. 

Mr. SELIM. Sure. One organization, Life After Hate. 

Mr. THOMPSON. All right. 

Mr. SELIM. Two organizations, Project CeaseFire in Chicago. 

Mr. THOMPSON. All right. 

Mr. SELIM. No. 3, Muflihun, which is a Muslim-based organization here in northern Virginia. No. 3—is that No. 4? WORDE Organization, World Resource and Development Organization based in 

Montgomery County, Maryland. And No. 5, there is an NGO which 

name eludes me at the moment in Los Angeles. 

Mr. THOMPSON. All right. Now, you have named four. I want you 

to provide this committee—— 

Mr. SELIM. Mm-hmm. 

29 

Mr. THOMPSON [continuing]. With whatever that engagement has 

been up to this point in writing. 

Mr. SELIM. Absolutely. 

Mr. THOMPSON. OK. Third, are you aware that domestic terrorists’ threat in this country, as documented by a number of sources, 

comes more from the right-wing elements in this country rather 

than the left or the Muslim threat or anything like that? 

Mr. SELIM. I have seen some of that data, but I am not a gun 

or violence expert in that regard. 

Mr. THOMPSON. I didn’t say gun or violent. I am saying the 

threat, the threat. 

Mr. SELIM. I am wholly aware of the range of ideologies that motivate violence in the United States. 

Mr. THOMPSON. So based on your professional position—— 

Mr. SELIM. Yes, sir. 

Mr. THOMPSON [continuing]. Where do you see the most violent 

threat existing in this country today? 

Mr. SELIM. As the Secretary of Homeland Security has testified 

at this table, the preeminent threat to our homeland security today 

is ISIL’s ability to recruit and radicalize. 

Mr. THOMPSON. You know, I don’t want you to split hairs, the 

facts irrefutable before this committee says just the opposite, absolutely the opposite. So I am really disappointed that you come before this committee ill-prepared to answer the questions. 

I yield back. 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair thanks the gentleman. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Florida, Mr. Clawson. 

Mr. CLAWSON. I yield my time back to the Chairman, Mr. Perry. 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair thanks the gentleman. 

Mr. Selim, under the headline, under the banner of countering 

violent extremism, would you consider white supremacist extremism under your umbrella of threats to deal with? 

Mr. SELIM. Mr. Chairman, we define violent extremism in the 

Executive branch as ideologically-motivated violence to further political goals, irrespective of what the ideology is. It could be domestic in nature or it could be foreign-inspired in nature. 

Mr. PERRY. OK. Let me use another term that—would you consider the Ku Klux Klan someone that you or your organization 

would wish to deal with in countering violent extremism? 

Mr. SELIM. I don’t think the DHS Office of Community Partnerships wishes to deal with the Ku Klux Klan, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. PERRY. I didn’t say deal with them as in deal with them in 

working some kind of an agreement with them, but the things that 

they espouse. Is that a problem in our country that you would fall 

under the scope of your purview? 

Mr. SELIM. To the extent that any organization, either foreign or 

domestic, espouses violence in the United States, that—— 

Mr. PERRY. Have they not espoused violence in the past? 

Mr. SELIM. Has the Ku Klux Klan? 

Mr. PERRY. Yes. 

Mr. SELIM. Absolutely they have. 

Mr. PERRY. OK. So shouldn’t they—so I am just trying to figure 

out if they fall under the umbrella of your purview. 

30 

Mr. SELIM. Ideologically-motivated violence, whether that be—— 

Mr. PERRY. Are they not ideologically motivated? 

Mr. SELIM. I believe they are. 

Mr. PERRY. OK. So it seems to me they fit all the requirements. 

I am just trying to get a simple indication that—of whether we are 

trying to figure out what you consider CVE. Maybe I know. Maybe 

Mr. Thompson knows what he considers it to be. We are trying to 

figure out what you consider it to be, so we are giving you examples. I used this one. 

Based on that, based on the information that you just provided— 

ideological history of violence, would they fall under that—within 

your purview based on your definition, your guidelines, your mission? 

Mr. SELIM. To the extent that an applicant for the Countering 

Violent Extremism Grant Program wants to institute some type of 

program to counter the ability for a Ku Klux Klan or any other organization to espouse the type of violence that they have done historically, that would absolutely fit within the remit of our office. 

Mr. PERRY. OK. So you are talking about the grant program and 

applicants that say, look, we want to deal with—when I say deal 

with in the context of we want to minimize the effect, influence of 

an organization that is a white supremacist organization, such as 

the Ku Klux Klan, that would be something you would be interested in engaging in? 

Mr. SELIM. Again, nothing in my office, the Office of Community 

Partnerships, or in this grant program, there is no targeting of a 

specific group. This is why when we talk about countering violent 

extremism, this is a threat-based effort, right? There is an immediate threat in the homeland today—— 

Mr. PERRY. Right. 

Mr. SELIM [continuing]. By enemies of the United States, sworn 

enemies of the United States, to recruit and radicalize here in the 

homeland. What this office’s mission and what the resources we 

are putting out are for are to prevent and intervene in that process 

of radicalization, sir. 

Mr. PERRY. So there is no thought whatsoever to different organizations that are known—that are known by most Americans, certainly by the records, to have an ideological interest in and use violence to promote their political objectives. As long as it has a name 

to it, you don’t look at the name. You just look at any—anybody. 

Mr. SELIM. We are—I apologize. I misunderstood the question. 

Let me draw a clear distinction. We are not an office that does 

analysis on hate or different terrorist organizations. 

My office is purely focused on—again, as I laid out earlier, developing and building the partnerships with communities across the 

country and the range of stakeholders that I laid out, as well 

as—— 

Mr. PERRY. Well, goodness, I don’t know how you direct your resources if you have no idea where you are headed. You don’t even— 

if you don’t know where you are going, how do you know where to 

direct your resources? You can’t name one—I just gave you an organization and you essentially said, no, they are not one of the— 

I—— 

Mr. SELIM. We are not focused on specific organizations. 

31 

Mr. PERRY. But what are you focused on? 

Mr. SELIM. We are focused on providing tools and resources to 

Federal, State, local, and community partners who are themselves, 

as the Congressman alluded to earlier, on the front lines of preventing radicalization and—— 

Mr. PERRY. By who? Radicalization by who? 

Mr. SELIM. You know, different, different—it is not the place of 

my office to tell a police chief or sheriff in Cleveland, Ohio or Los 

Angeles, California how they should be driving and implementing 

their own program. This is why, as part of the grant program, 

there is a very specific needs analysis and a quantitative set of 

metrics that speak to how these programs will be applied. 

Mr. PERRY. So even being fully aware of the actions of certain entities, whether domestic, whether racist, whether religiously motivated if that terminology can be used, it makes no difference to 

you. And you wouldn’t be able to identify them and place your assets in that direction to have the greatest effect—— 

Mr. SELIM. Let me—— 

Mr. PERRY [continuing]. Based on this paradigm that you just 

laid out for me? 

Mr. SELIM. Let me just go back and be very clear on one thing. 

The Department of Homeland Security, including my office, assesses that the preeminent threat to our homeland security today 

is ISIL’s ability to recruit and radicalize in the homeland. 

Mr. PERRY. So you do differentiate with ISIS or ISIL. Not this 

other one that I mentioned, but ISIL you do make that distinction. 

Mr. SELIM. We differentiate in the sense of the threat of terrorism in the United States. 

Mr. PERRY. All right. I think I am gonna come back to you, Mr. 

Selim. I have got some further questions based on the information 

I just gleaned from you, but my time has expired and I want to respect the other Members’ time in attendance here. 

So I will now yield and the gentleman—correction. The 

gentlelady. Correction. She has left. The gentleman from Minnesota, Mr. Ellison, is now recognized. 

Mr. ELLISON. Yes, Mr. Chair and Ranking Member, allow me to 

thank you for being here today. I am grateful for the opportunity. 

I want to just confer how much respect I have for this very important committee. 

Let me say this. If I were to say the words radical Islamist terrorists, it wouldn’t stop—it wouldn’t make ISIS vanish. Use of the 

words is not the thing. Here is the thing. Organizations like Daesh 

and ISIS are homicidal maniacs trying to kill us. We know that. 

They don’t care what religion we are. They will harm us all. 

But they are also—they are not stupid. They are trying to gain 

legitimacy in the eyes of people they are trying to recruit. 

Now, maybe in a country like our own where I was born and 

raised—and I am 14 generations in the United States, which is a 

majority Christian country—my mother, all my family members 

are Christian. I love them deeply. I love my whole community. 

To say that Islam has got tremendous legitimacy, we might not 

recognize that because of the environment we are in. But in the nations where it does predominate, which is 1.5 billion people in this 

world, putting the word Islamic in your title does confer legitimacy. 

32 

Just as if I were to call—a group were to call themselves the 

Christian so-and-so-and-so’s, people in America and other Christian-majority countries would think, well, they are probably good 

guys, ’cause we associate that with that word. 

Now, if the Ku Klux Klan were to burn crosses and claim to be 

associated with Christianity, we would know what they were doing 

is trying to exploit the majority of the population’s attachment to 

that term in order to gain support, when what they really want to 

do is murder, kill, and terrorize black people. 

This is exactly what Daesh is doing, which is why we don’t call 

them Islamic terrorists, Muslim terrorists. They hope we call them 

that. They want us to call them that. Whenever we call them that, 

there is some unsuspecting person out there who might be tricked 

into believing that they actually stand for Islam. That doesn’t help 

America. 

We should be trying to expand our friendships and isolate our 

enemies. Instead, by saying no Muslims can come into the country, 

lying about saying that Muslims were happy after 9/11, which they 

absolutely were not, proven in multiple environments, all we do is 

help Daesh recruit. 

Now, I know about Daesh recruitment. They had me in a magazine saying they wanted to kill me personally by name. So, you 

know, this idea that just saying radical Islamist terrorist is somehow going to do anything, it is not going to do anything other than 

help ISIS recruit. 

I don’t want to help ISIS recruit. I want to strip them of any legitimacy that they have. I think that we all should join in that. Absolutely we should be researching their core ideology and motivation. Nothing about calling them extremists, violent extremists 

stops us from doing that. Absolutely we should understand how 

they think and what motivates them. 

If they pervert religious verses in order to do what they want to 

do, we should certainly—and research that. But I am not going to 

say that Timothy McVeigh is a freedom fighter. He is not. He is 

a terrorist. I am not going to say that Daesh is Islamic. There is 

neither a State, nor they are Islamic. They are criminal, and they 

need to be treated like that. 

Let me move on to say that—it was said that—there was a question—I think there was some question that said that we should 

perhaps prohibit the Islamic Society of North America from being 

able to apply for a grant or getting a grant. 

I have been to Islamic Society of North America organizations. 

I think that they are an excellent group. I don’t see any problem 

with them. I am glad that our Government is reaching out to them. 

I can tell you that if ISIS is recruiting and the American Government is recruiting, we better be talking to people who we can get 

on our side as opposed to shunning them. It would be a bad idea 

to do that. It would not help us protect our country. Let me say, 

if we were to prohibit ISNA, I think we would be engaging in unconstitutional behavior because there is something called a bill of 

attainder. 

A bill of attainder says you cannot pass a law criminalizing 

somebody. People get trials in America, which brings me to a point 

about this unindicted co-conspirator. As a person who must have 

33 

tried 50 cases to a jury—I used to be a public defender, I know. 

I may not know love, but I know criminal—I know how to try a 

case in court. 

Unindicted co-conspirator means unindicted. If they were indicted, then now you are talking. But even then, that is just a very 

low threshold of probable cause. But unindicted means nothing. It 

means absolutely nothing. 

If any one of us were unindicted co-conspirators, you know what 

that would mean? That we are innocent. So to use that term to try 

to eliminate people is just bad, it is just a misunderstanding of 

what the law is. 

So finally, I just want to say thank you to you, Mr. Selim, for 

coming to my community, talking to my community about how we 

forge better ties and trust and communication so people know and 

understand that the American government is not against them. 

We want to be engaged. We want to talk. They criticized you a 

little bit, and you took it all, and you listened. Then you said your 

job is to work with the community to protect the community. So I 

want to thank you for keeping your ears open and your mind open. 

In Minneapolis, I think you did a good job. 

Mr. SELIM. Thank you. Can I make just one point to that remark, Mr. Chairman? 

Congressman Ellison, I want to thank you for allowing me the 

opportunity to come to your district and work with you and your 

team on that. 

I want to make one point clear to the entire committee that, on 

the programs and measures that my office implements on a dayto-day basis, there is not uniform agreement in communities, Muslim communities or non-Muslim communities, on the best way to 

do this. 

I think what Congressman Ellison is referring to or inferring, actually, is that there was some pushback on the programs that my 

office has espoused and implemented. 

However, you know, the degree to which myself as the director 

and my team sits and engages with community stakeholders in a 

constructive dialog, and we can shape and tailor our programs for 

maximum effectiveness, that is the ultimate message that I want 

to convey today to the committee, is that we are at the table. We 

look to be at the table in communities across the country to shape 

and tailor these initiatives. 

I get calls and e-mails all the time from communities saying 

ISIL, Daesh, or some other terrorist organization does not represent our religion, our community, or our faith. What can we do? 

So, the CVE programs that we are implementing are voluntary in 

nature. We are servicing community and local stakeholders who 

want to implement these initiatives. 

That is a very important part. This is not a prescription. We are 

not requiring any group to do that. Some people in the Twin Cities, 

in the Minneapolis area, want to have a seat at the table for this. 

Others do not. 

That is fine. Our job as the Federal Government, as DHS, is to 

work with those who want to be at the table and also address concerns of those that don’t want to be involved in these initiatives 

and have concerns about the programs. Thank you for that. 

34 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair thanks the gentleman. 

The Chair recognizes the gentleman Mr. Pascrell from New Jersey. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thanks for having the 

hearing. I think it is very worthwhile. I want to say hello to the 

Ranking Member, and the Ranking Member on this committee, 

subcommittee. 

Mr. Selim, I know your record. You came from the last administration. I thank you for your service to your country. But when you 

are—a little advice. You don’t need it from me, but let me give it 

anyway. When you are answering questions from this committee, 

I would advise you, when we are talking about the causes of 

radicalization, when we were talking about that, you used the word 

metrics many, many times. 

When you are using the word metrics, you are not being straight 

with the committee, and I am sure you are not doing it intentionally. Metrics is a good word we like to use to throw people into 

a dizzy. Just be straight about your answers, whether you have the 

information or you don’t have the information. 

So the recent events in Jersey and New York underscore how the 

threat of violent extremism has evolved, Charleston, Dallas, Oak 

Creek. We have seen an uptick, Mr. Chairman, in instances of 

home-grown violent extremism. 

So it is critical we ensure the government is working to prevent 

the spread of violent extremists’ ideology by using the limited resources wisely. As you briefly noted in your testimony, and despite 

common misperceptions from what you often hear in the media, extremists and threats come from a wide range of groups and individuals. 

I have known and talked about the threat of domestic terrorism, 

usually in the form of anti-Government extremism in this country. 

My oath of office, the priority, I am pledged to stop foreign and domestic intrusions. It is the first part of my oath of office, as well 

as the President of the United States. 

What threat has been posed here? Ever since I was the original 

Member of the House Homeland Security Committee when it was 

created. In 2009, a DHS report on right-wing extremism was 

leaked and prompted an outcry. Resulted in the DHS cutting a 

number of personnel studying, for the record, domestic terrorism 

unrelated to Islam, and held up nearly a dozen reports on extremist groups. 

I spoke out very strongly against this decision. It was carried 

over into this administration’s decision. We cannot allow people to 

silence facts just because the facts do not fit their preferred narrative of who we should and shouldn’t be afraid of and concerned 

about. 

Eric Hoffer wrote in his book ‘‘The True Believer,’’ which is my 

bible about radical thoughts, radical actions against our Nation. 

We want to protect those people that voted for us, didn’t vote for 

us but live in our district and live in this country. 

We had three police folks that testified yesterday. I was not here, 

but I know what they said. Deputy Chief Miller from New York, 

New York City. Those guys and gals do a terrific job day-in and 

day-out, and you said it one—better than I did in your testimony. 

35 

My job is to protect them. See, anybody who we decide is going to 

protect us, we have to protect them. 

Mr. Chairman, I have to take exception to one thing that you 

said before. I agreed with most of the stuff you were talking about. 

You said, you questioned, and I think you have a right to, the heart 

of the issue, went right to the heart of the issue about National security. 

Why should we be perhaps providing dollars to terrorist groups? 

I hope these groups are being vetted. I am sure you do, too. Well, 

then why do we allow guns to go to terrorists? So we don’t want 

them to get the dollars, but we allow them at the same time to buy 

weapons. 

That is not a slippery slope to defining or destroying the Second 

Amendment of the United States. It is protecting our law enforcement officers who are outgunned in the streets, regardless of what 

we are talking about, the gangs, or we are talking about the gangs 

of terrorism. 

I beg you to think about this in that terms. I agree with you. We 

don’t want to give money to those folks who we gotta really question, wonder where you are going to spend the money. We do that 

many times in our foreign aid, don’t we? I ask you just to take an 

objective look at that thing. If I may—I am going over—can I ask 

the witness one question? 

Mr. PERRY. Go ahead. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you. 

Mr. Selim, in March of this year we sent a letter—I sent a letter 

to Secretary Johnson and Attorney General Lynch. The CVE task 

force announced—and since you are here today, I would like to discuss its goals. 

Here is my question. According to the New America Foundation, 

there have been more incidents of right-wing extremist attacks in 

the United States than violent jihadist attacks since 9/11. I am not 

minimizing jihadist attacks. 

In that light, can you describe how your office plans to counter 

violent extremism with respect to domestic right-wing extremism? 

If you want me to define it over the last 15 years, I will go chapter 

and verse, but you know what I am talking about. How do you define it, and what is your office doing about it? Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your indulgence. 

Mr. SELIM. So, Congressman, thank you for that question. On the 

oath of office that I took in this job—to the point you made on the 

oath that you took in your job. As the oath I took when I was 

sworn into the United States Navy, I similarly took a pledge to defend and protect the Constitution and the United States against all 

threats, foreign and domestic. I want to assure you that I take that 

oath very seriously. That is, I hope, reflected in the job that I am 

doing on a day-to-day basis. 

With specific regard to your question in what we are doing, the 

role of the CVE task force is one to coordinate all the different CVE 

efforts across departments and agencies. It is not a operational 

body per se. The task force is not deploying into a particular city 

and doing things like that. It is a Washington-based body to coordinate all the disparate resources that are currently existing in different departments and agencies. 

36 

The tools and resources that we supply to our State, local, and 

community-based partners related to CVE are ones that can hopefully prevent and intervene in the process of radicalization, whether it is a domestic extremist radicalization or an international terrorist organization that is attempting to recruit and radicalize. 

The research and the data has shown us—and I am happy to follow up with you on this in great detail—is that the similarities of 

paths of radicalization of someone who will commit an act of terrorism in the homeland is very similar, whether they are a Timothy McVeigh or whether they are a young person in this country 

that is being recruited and radicalized by a group like ISIL. 

What we are attempting to do is supply tools and resources at 

the State and local level for local officials, community partners, and 

municipal leaders to prevent and intervene and recognize those 

signs, irrespective of where it is motivated on. 

So there is not a special focus on D.T. and a different focus on 

international-related terrorism. The tools and opportunities to prevent and intervene in that process can equally be applied on both. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Are you supplying the information to the subcommittee? 

Mr. SELIM. I am attempting to. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Well, I think that is critical, Mr. Chairman, so we 

know where we are going. I thank you. 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair thanks the gentleman. 

The Chair asks unanimous consent that the gentleman from 

North Carolina, Mr. Meadows, be allowed to sit on the dais, participate in today’s hearing. Without objection, so ordered. The Chair 

recognizes Mr. Meadows. 

Mr. MEADOWS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank the committee for your fine work. Obviously, we have been doing some parallel work in the committee that I sit on. So let me follow up on 

this last question, because it is intriguing, with my colleague opposite here, in terms of his definition, quoting some group. 

We just had a hearing just the other day which had said that 

most of the threats that we are actually facing here—not to underscore some of the horrific things that have happened in South 

Carolina and in other areas, but we have been trained over the 

years—our law enforcement has been trained to be able to address 

those kinds of threats that the gentleman would say are right-wing 

extremists. 

Yet the numbers don’t seem to back that up. I mean, it wasn’t 

right-wing extremists that stabbed someone in Minnesota this 

week. It wasn’t right-wing extremists that exploded bombs in New 

Jersey and New York. 

So when we look at that—in fact, the No. 1 stat that I saw was 

actually the Taliban was higher than ISIS, even though ISIS kinda 

dominates this. So what stats do you have, since you have been 

working on this, that would suggest that the No. 1 threat are rightwing extremists and not the radicalization of others? 

Mr. SELIM. Congressman, I want to clarify a point. I hope in no 

way, shape, or form did I give the impression that the threat of domestic extremism by the groups you just mentioned are more severe than that of ISIS. I have said—— 

Mr. MEADOWS. Well—— 

37 

Mr. SELIM. I have said repeatedly—— 

Mr. MEADOWS [continuing]. Kind-of indirectly. You said that, you 

know, you are here to defend the country. I appreciate your service 

as a naval officer. I appreciate your willingness to defend the Constitution. 

But here is—what we haven’t done is actually many times define 

the enemy. It is critical that we start to do that. So with the CVE 

joint task force. Name four or five accomplishments that have happened since January 2016. What are the accomplishments? 

Mr. SELIM. So just to clarify time line. The task force was announced in January, but we didn’t actually come together with 

interagency representatives until April of this past year. 

Mr. MEADOWS. So name three accomplishments since April. 

Mr. SELIM. Just to clarify the time line. So there has been a 

number of accomplishments. The first is that there are a number 

of different entities across the Department of Homeland Security, 

the Department of Justice, the FBI, the National Counterterrorism 

Center that were reaching out to State, local, community, and municipal officials to provide different products, threat briefings, exercises and so on. 

Mr. MEADOWS. So how many of those have you done? 

Mr. SELIM. As an office, I would have to go back and get you the 

specific number. But the point on the accomplishment—— 

Mr. MEADOWS. More than 100? Less than 100? 

Mr. SELIM. In the past year? Probably. But I can give you the 

specific number. 

Mr. MEADOWS. But you can report back to the subcommittee? 

Mr. SELIM. Yes, absolutely. 

Mr. MEADOWS. OK. All right. 

Mr. SELIM. The point on the accomplishment is we have tied that 

all together in one place. So when there is a request for some type 

of training or assistance in that regard, we have a specific group 

focused on training and engagement that is focused just on synchronizing that and ensuring we are getting the best products and 

delivery out to State and local officials. 

Mr. MEADOWS. All right. I guess according to the testimony, it 

says that the CVE grant funding is done through a competitive 

panel-review application process. I think—— 

Mr. SELIM. Yes, sir—— 

Mr. MEADOWS [continuing]. That is a quote. 

Mr. SELIM. Correct. 

Mr. MEADOWS. So what are the criteria for evaluating? 

Mr. SELIM. So I don’t want to take up your time here on the 

panel. We have listed out on page 26 of the notice of funding here 

10 clear objective criteria that every potential applicant has to—— 

Mr. MEADOWS. So what is the top one out of the 10? 

Mr. SELIM. Demonstrating expertise. 

Mr. MEADOWS. All right. So how do you determine—who determines that they have expertise? 

Mr. SELIM. Each and every application is independently reviewed 

by one of four people. An individual who works for me in the Office 

of Community Partnerships reviews and scores independently each 

application. 

38 

An interagency representative from the CVE Taskforce, someone 

from the FBI, DOJ, the National Counterterrorism Center. Including non-security agencies, education, HHS, and others that are part 

of this whole-of-Government effort. They independently score and 

review each application. 

Mr. MEADOWS. All right. 

Mr. SELIM. FEMA—sorry. 

Mr. MEADOWS. Yes, so let me interrupt because I got 36 seconds 

left. 

So as we look at that, as you start to evaluate those, how do you 

respond to some of the criticism that has been out there that potentially grants go to groups that may not be fully aligned with protecting our National security interests? Is that a valid criticism? 

Mr. SELIM. Congressman, I can assure you that I take the awarding of Federal grants, taxpayer dollars, with the utmost seriousness. Doing the due diligence—— 

Mr. MEADOWS. Have you made any mistakes? 

Mr. SELIM [continuing]. Through this process—sorry. 

Mr. MEADOWS. Have you—have you made any mistakes? 

Mr. SELIM. Ever in my life? 

Mr. MEADOWS. Well, in this process. No, obviously—I am married. I get reminded of that on a regular basis, so—— 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. SELIM. I would say that this is the first time that we—this 

is the first time ever, as I pointed out in my oral statement, that 

such a great opportunity has existed in the U.S. Government. 

So it is a learning process. Some of the things that we are doing 

in this first fiscal year 2016 period I will likely change and amend 

for fiscal year 2017, just based on the feedback that we have received from our potential applicants. So there is always room to improve the process. 

Mr. MEADOWS. So with the Chairman’s indulgence, I will ask my 

last question and yield back. Is if you were to put two different 

groups that we have to be most concerned about radicalizing individuals here in the United States, who would those two groups be? 

Mr. SELIM. ISIL is the preeminent threat in the United States 

to our homeland security. 

Mr. MEADOWS. Who is the second? 

Mr. SELIM. Any al-Qaeda or similarly-aligned Sunni extremist 

group. 

Mr. MEADOWS. All right. 

I yield back. Thank you. 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair thanks the gentleman. The Chair thanks 

the witness for his valuable testimony and the Members for their 

questions. 

The first panel is now excused. The clerk will prepare the witness table for the second panel. 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair will now introduce our witnesses for the 

second panel. 

The Honorable Peter Hoekstra served in Congress for 18 years 

representing Michigan’s 2nd Congressional District from 1993 to 

2011. He was the Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence from 2004 through January 2007. 

39 

He was responsible for leading Congressional oversight of the 

U.S. intelligence community to confront the threats of the 21st 

Century, such as global Islamist terror and cyber warfare, including restructuring the intelligence community with landmark legislation following the 9/11 Commission Report. 

He now serves as the Shillman senior fellow with the Investigative Project on Terrorism and is a frequent commentator and writer 

on radical Islam. 

Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser is the founder and president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy. The forum seeks to counter political Islam, the ideology that fuels radical Islamists. Dr. Jasser 

was appointed to the United States Commission on International 

Religious Freedom in 2012. He has testified before Congressional 

committees on numerous occasions. 

Dr. Jasser served 11 years as a medical officer in the U.S. Navy 

and is a past president of the Arizona Medical Association. We 

thank you for your service, sir. 

Ms. Sahar Aziz, do I have the first name correct, ma’am? Thank 

you—is a professor of law at Texas A&M University School of Law, 

where she teaches courses on National security, civil rights, and 

Middle East law. Ms. Aziz is also a non-resident fellow at the 

Brookings Doha Center. Prior to joining Texas A&M, she served as 

a senior policy adviser for DHS’ Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties. 

Ms. Shireen Qudosi is an author, including a senior contributor 

at counterjihad.com and the founder of the Qudosi Chronicles, a 

blog about Islam in the 21st Century which supports Muslim reformers. For over 10 years, she has been an active advocate of progressive Islam, both educating non-Muslims about Islam and encouraging Muslims to engage in dialog. She has been recognized as 

one of the top 10 North American Muslim reformers. 

Thank you all for being here today. 

The Chair now recognizes Mr. Hoekstra for an opening statement. 

STATEMENT OF HON. PETER HOEKSTRA, FORMER CHAIRMAN, 

HOUSE PERMANENT SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE 

Mr. HOEKSTRA. It has been a while since I have been here. So 

thank you, Chairman Perry, Ranking Member Coleman, other distinguished Members of the panel for enabling me to testify here 

today. 

Since I left Congress, I have had the opportunity to work with 

the Investigative Project on Terrorism. This has been a leading organization studying the threat of radical Islam for over 20 years. 

It has always been at the forefront. I would like to submit my testimony for the record. 

Mr. PERRY. Without objection, so ordered. 

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You know, there are 

just a couple of points that I would like to highlight as we go 

through the testimony. I would like to—that I think are important. 

No. 1, the trend lines in the war have not been going in the right 

direction. You know, recently the University of Maryland completed a study that showed that back in 2001, roughly 2,500 people 

40 

per year were losing their lives as a result of radical jihadist terrorist activities. 

In 2007, 2008, 2009, that number had gone from roughly 2,500— 

I think we have a chart to show that—had gone from roughly 2,500 

to about 3,000, 3,300 in that time frame. So it was a significant increase, but not dramatic. But then take a look at the line what 

happens after 2008 to 2015, and what we are projecting for 2016. 

That number has increased from roughly, you know, slightly over 

3,000 people per year to approaching 30,000 people per year losing 

their lives globally as a result of radical jihadism. 

The second slide that I will use that will be up there shows what 

the spread of radical jihadism has been, the global expansion— 

2001, you could look at the globe and it would be in a number of 

different places. Two thousand nine, 2010, it was kinda concentrated in the Middle East. 

But the threat that we see evolving and where we see the threat 

today, is we see it obviously in the Middle East. We see it in Northern Africa. It is now spreading into Asia. We also see what is happening in Europe and obviously the United States is at risk. So the 

numbers and the trend line are clearly heading in the wrong direction. The geographic spread of the threat from radical jihadism is 

going in the wrong direction. 

This is a war that we are not winning today. We are not containing it, we are not confronting it, and we are not defeating it. 

The key question, I think, that Congress needs to ask is what has 

happened, potentially, to create this dramatic increase since 2008? 

From 2001 to 2008, 2009, you know, it stayed relatively contained. But since that time we have seen it escalate—escalate significantly. We now have five failed States that are havens for radical jihadists, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen, and Afghanistan. 

So this is places where these organizations can plan. They can 

train. They can prepare to launch attacks against the West, against 

America, and other places in the Middle East. 

I really encourage the committee to take a very, very hard look, 

an in-depth dive on what is called PSD–11, Presidential Study Directive 11. This came out of—it is still Classified, but there has 

been a lot written about this document in the media. So it has been 

leaked to various people. But what PSD–11 does is it fundamentally changed America’s approach toward the Muslim world. 

For 40 years, on a bipartisan basis, Republican and Democratic 

administrations had said our goal in the Middle East was stability 

and security—2010, 2011 time frame, the President and his administration said that that policy was—they were going to take a look 

at it. David Ignatius, in one of the columns that he wrote back 

then, indicated that a White House official said, ‘‘We are rolling the 

dice.’’ 

Well, it didn’t turn out very well, because the strategy now said 

we were going to engage with elements of reform. Well, that ended 

up being organizations like the Muslim Brotherhood and other radical jihadist groups. We did not choose wisely. 

In Egypt, we facilitated the overthrow of Mubarak, someone who 

I met with, many American officials had met with. This was an individual in a country that for years did everything that we asked 

41 

1 Steven Emerson and Pete Hoekstra. ‘‘Islamist Terror Growing in Lethality and Geography, 

IPT Analysis Finds,’’ The Investigative Project on Terrorism, March 28, 2016, http:// 

www.investigativeproject.org/5241/islamist-terror-growing-in-lethality. 

them to do to maintain stability and fight radical jihadists in that 

part of the world. 

We facilitated and participated in the overthrow of Gaddafi. 

Again, Gaddafi reformed in 2003, 2004. Someone who had been our 

enemy, but because of consistent Republican and Democrat administrations putting sanctions on him and holding his feet to the fire, 

in 2004 he changed sides. He got rid of his nuclear weapons program. He paid reparations. He started to fight radical jihadists 

with us. 

We took an island of stability in Northern Africa, and it became 

a hotbed of extremism, exporting weapons, exporting fighters and 

ideology throughout Northern Africa, the Middle East, and being a 

launching pad into Europe. 

In closing, let me just say that I think it is time for Congress to 

ask this administration some very serious questions about PSD–11. 

Exactly what is the content of PSD–11? What were the criteria for 

vetting organizations in Libya, Iraq, Egypt, Syria, and Afghanistan, 

and Yemen? What were the criteria for vetting organizations that 

we would work with? 

What groups and individuals actually passed through the vetting 

process and we started to engage with? The names of the organizations of the individuals responsible for vetting the new groups, and 

any and all assessments by the U.S. Government of the activities 

undertaken by these groups or from 2012 until today. 

I think that you will find that the change in policy is the primary 

reason for the instability and the rapid spread of radical jihadism 

throughout the Middle East and the increased threat to the homeland. 

Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Hon. Hoekstra follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. PETER HOEKSTRA

SEPTEMBER 22, 2016 

Good morning Chairman Perry, Ranking Member Coleman, and distinguished 

Members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you 

today to discuss the need to identify the radical Islamist terror threat. 

The Investigative Project on Terrorism works tirelessly to ensure that political 

leaders, National security officials and fellow Americans understand that the United 

States cannot defeat radical Islam without defining it. 

Islamists and their sympathizers hate us and they will not stop hating us. 

Islamists, or ‘‘caliphists’’ as I like to call them, pursue three objectives: Establish 

a caliphate, install a caliph to rule it and govern it under strict sharia law. They 

yield no middle ground or accommodation. Thus far, the United States has been unsuccessful in confronting and containing the threat on our path to ultimately winning. 

EVIDENCE

The trends in the war against Islamist terror both in fatalities and breadth are 

not positive. 

On a global scale, jihadists murdered an average of 2,500 innocents annually between 2001 and 2006. The number grew to approximately 3,300 innocents by 2009, 

which tripled to roughly 9,500 in 2012 and tripled again to nearly 30,000 killed last 

year.1

42 

2 Ibid. 3 ‘‘Global Trends: Forced Displacement in 2015,’’ United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, June 20, 2016. 4 Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, Quarterly Update, April–June 2016, http:// 

www.internal-displacement.org/assets/publications/2016/IDMC-quarterly-update-2016- 

QU2final.pdf. 5 ‘‘Remarks by the President at Cairo University, 6–04–09,’’ The White House, Office of the 

Press Secretary (Cairo, Egypt), June 4, 2009, https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/ 

remarks-president-cairo-university-6-04-09. 6 ‘‘Background: OIC-US Cooperation—2011–08–08,’’ Organization of Islamic Cooperation, http://www.oicun.org/oicus/64/20110808013147562.html. 7 ‘‘Eighth OIC Observatory Report on Islamophobia,’’ Presented to the 42nd Council of Foreign 

Ministers, Kuwait City, State of Kuwait, May 2014–April 2015, http://www.oic-oci.org/oicv2/ 

upload/islamophobia/2015/en/reports/8thlOblReplIslamophobialFinal.pdf. 8 ‘‘U.N. Human Rights Council (HRC) Resolution 16/18,’’ Human Rights Council, Sixteenth 

Session, Agenda item 9, March 21, 2011, http://geneva.usmission.gov/wp-content/uploads/ 

2012/04/Resolution16-18.pdf. 9 Andrew C. McCarthy, ‘‘In Initially Airbrushing Orlando Jihadists’s Calls, DOJ Followed 

Obama-Clinton U.N. Resolution against Negative Speech about Islam,’’ National Review, June 

20, 2016, http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/436854/doj-followed-obama-clinton-un-resolution-against-negative-speech-about-islam. 10 Deborah Weiss, ‘‘U.S. Praises Sharia Censorship,’’ FrontPage Magazine, May 23, 2013, 

http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/190622/us-praises-sharia-censorship-deborah-weiss. 11 ‘‘Remarks at the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) High-Level Meeting on Combating Religious Intolerance,’’ Istanbul, Turkey, July 15, 2011, http://www.state.gov/secretary/ 

20092013clinton/rm/2011/07/168636.htm. 12 Nina Shea. ‘‘A perverse ‘Process,’ ’’ New York Post, Dec. 17, 2011, http://nypost.com/2011/ 

12/17/a-perverse-process/. 

The increase in the number of victims corresponds to a wider theater of operations. From 2001–06, the threat was dispersed in area and occurred primarily in 

10 countries. By 2015, significant Islamist terrorist activity could be found in 18 

countries, with most concentrated in Africa and the Middle East.2

Today Libya, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Afghanistan are failed states. The Islamist 

cancer endangers Turkey, Jordan, Lebanon, and Saudi Arabia. In Asia the threat 

is growing in countries like Thailand, Bangladesh, Pakistan, the Philippines, and 

Indonesia. 

The massive migrant flows into Europe, the lack of effective assimilation and the 

attacks in Paris, Cologne, Brussels, Nice, London, and others highlight the growing 

menace in Europe. The United States has experienced its own manifestation of radical Islam with the violent attacks in Orlando, San Bernardino, and military installations throughout the country, as well as most recently with the attacks in New 

York, New Jersey, and Minnesota. 

There were 2.74 million refugees from the Middle East and North Africa in 2015.3

Additionally, there were approximately 4.8 million internally displaced persons in 

the Middle East alone. Iraq, Syria, and Yemen accounted for more than half of the 

total.4

What happened from 2009 to 2016 that led to such a massive increase in Islamist 

violence? 

U.N RESOLUTION 16/18

Ever since President Obama delivered his 2009 Cairo speech in which he declared 

his responsibility ‘‘to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam,’’5 his administration has strengthened a partnership with the Saudi Arabia-based Organization of 

Islamic Cooperation (OIC).6 The OIC is a 57-member government body that incorporates the contrived term ‘‘Islamophobia’’ into its rhetoric and diplomacy to counter 

perceived criticism of Islam or linking religion with terrorism.7

In March 2011, the partnership resulted in the adoption of U.N. Human Rights 

Council Resolution 16/18 to combat Islamophobia.8

The resolution seeks ‘‘to criminalize incitement to imminent violence based on religion or belief’’ and in so doing supports the suppression of any speech that negatively portrays Islam. Experts assert that the resolution ‘‘effectively imposes Sharia 

blasphemy standards on American law’’ and stands in ‘‘violation of First Amendment free-speech principles.’’9

As one commentator noted, ‘‘Unfortunately, America’s concern for the protection 

of free speech seems to have gotten lost as its focus moved closer to the OIC’s positions, and an emphasis was placed on protecting Muslims in the West from 

‘Islamophobia.’ ’’10

Secretary of State Clinton co-chaired an OIC ministerial meeting in Istanbul on 

‘‘religious intolerance’’ in July 2011 to spearhead efforts to implement the resolution 11 that came to be known as the ‘‘Istanbul Process.’’12 At the meeting, Clinton 

43 

13 ‘‘Remarks at the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) High-Level Meeting on Combating Religious Intolerance,’’ Istanbul, Turkey, July 15, 2011, http://www.state.gov/secretary/ 

20092013clinton/rm/2011/07/168636.htm. 14 Nina Shea, ‘‘The Administration Takes on ‘Islamophobia,’ ’’ Hudson Institute, Sept. 1, 2011, 

http://www.hudson.org/research/8286-the-administration-takes-on-islamophobia-. 15 ‘‘Newly Released Documents Confirm White House Officials Set Hillary Clinton’s Benghazi 

Response,’’ Judicial Watch, June 29, 2015, http://www.judicialwatch.org/press-room/press-releases/judicial-watch-newly-released-documents-confirm-white-house-officials-set-hillary-clintonsbenghazi-response/. 16 David Ignatius. ‘‘Obama’s low-key strategy for the Middle East,’’ The Washington Post, 

March 6, 2011, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/04/ 

AR2011030404614.html. 17 ‘‘Rachid Ghannouchi, leader of Tunisia’s Ennadha Movement: Qatar has played a leading 

role in the success of the Arab revolutions.’’ Al-Arab, May 2, 2011, https://archive.is/lQQgY 

(Accessed May 21, 2015). 

advocated the use of interfaith dialogue and ‘‘good old-fashioned techniques of peer 

pressure and shaming’’13 to restrict freedom of speech without passing formal legislation to achieve the same results. Furthermore, the fact that the United States provided an international forum for airing grievances about Islamophobia only 

emboldened OIC demands for global blasphemy laws.14

The Obama-Clinton administration would later consult with the OIC to craft the 

fabricated story that an internet video that nobody had ever seen caused the Sept. 

11, 2012 massacre in Benghazi.15

PSD–11

In August 2010 Obama signed Presidential Study Directive–11 (PSD–11), which 

reportedly ordered a Government-wide reassessment of prospects for political reform 

in the Middle East and of the Muslim Brotherhood’s role in the process. 

Under PSD–11—which the administration needs to declassify—Obama and Clinton pivoted from the historical U.S. strategy of maintaining order and stability in 

the Middle East. It instead turned to a strategy that emphasized support for regime 

change, as well as political and democratic reforms, regardless of the impact on regional stability. PSD–11 directly led to U.S. engagement with the Muslim Brotherhood. 

U.S. officials did not concern themselves with questions over whether the new 

power structures would become allies or foes, or with intelligence agency warnings 

about the jihadist chaos such regime change might unleash. 

An official in the Obama White House indicated at the time, ‘‘It’s a roll of the 

dice . . . ’’.16

INTERNATIONAL IMPLICATIONS

The United States undermined long-time ally President Hosni Mubarak and embraced the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt after adopting PSD–11. Eventually Mubarak fell, and Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohamed Morsi won the presidency. 

For the first time since its founding in 1928, the Muslim Brotherhood ran a major 

country in the Middle East, and Obama and Clinton were willing accomplices. 

In Libya Muammar Gaddafi—a repressive dictator and state sponsor of terror for 

40 years—reversed course and by 2003–04 allied with the United States. He turned 

over his weapons programs. He paid reparations to the victims of his terrorist activity. He fought side-by-side with the West against radical jihadists. 

Under the guidance of PSD–11, the administration turned on Gaddafi and sided 

with the Muslim Brotherhood and al-Qaeda elements to dispose of him. Libya now 

exports weapons, training, and jihadist ideology throughout the greater region. 

DOMESTIC IMPLICATIONS

Federal law identifies anyone who ‘‘endorses or espouses terrorist activity or persuades others to endorse or espouse terrorist activity or support a terrorist organization’’ as an inadmissible alien under 8 USC 1182. 

Following the issuance of PSD–11 and the start of the Arab Spring, the Obama 

administration granted entry visas to individuals belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist groups who made statements supportive of Islamic terror 

activities. Many of them should not have received visas under Federal law. The 

United States previously denied visas to some of the individuals. Again, it was a 

major shift in U.S. policy. For example: 

Shiekh Rached Ghannouchi received an entry visa in the fall of 2011 despite his 

pro-Hamas statements 17 and his meeting with former Osama bin Laden lieutenant 

44 

18 ‘‘Exclusive: The truth about Abu Iyadh told by his bodyguard,’’ Tunisie Secret, Dec. 10, 

2014, https://archive.is/Akngg (Accessed Feb. 4, 2016). 19 Martin Kramer’s Facebook page, updated Oct. 25, 2011, https://archive.today/mwBrG 

(Accessed May 22, 2015). 20 Jen Psaki. ‘‘Secretary of State John Kerry’s Meeting with Moaz al-Khatib,’’ Department of 

State, press release, March 25, 2015, http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2015/03/239761.htm 

(Accessed May 20, 2015). 21 Samantha Power. Twitter post, March 24, 2015, 1:48 p.m., https://archive.is/uztqr 

(Accessed May 20, 2015). 22 Joyce Karam, Twitter post, March 24, 2015, 6:36 a.m., https://archive.today/HBMbM 

(Accessed May 20, 2015). 23 Mouaz al-Khatib. ‘‘The Coming Martyrs,’’ Darbuna.net, March 3, 2007, IPT translation from 

the Arabic, https://archive.today/xwbg4 (Accessed March 30, 2015). 24 Ibid. 25 ‘‘Moaz al-Khatib interview with Osman Osman,’’ Al-Jazeera video, 47:33, Aug. 15, 2012, IPT 

translation from Arabic, http://www.aljazeera.net/programs/religionandlife/2012/8/15/ 

%D9%86%D8%AD%D9%88-%D8%AD%D9%84%D9%81-%D9%81%D8%B6%D9%88%D9%84- 

%D8%AC%D8%AF%D9%8A%D8%AF (Accessed April 12, 2015). 26 Ken Timmerman. ‘‘Obama Administration let anti-gay Muslim leader into U.S.,’’ New York 

Post, March 2, 2014, http://nypost.com/2014/03/02/state-dept-lets-anti-gay-muslim-leader-intou-s/ (Accessed April 16, 2015). 27 Sheikh Mohammed Rateb Nabulsi. ‘‘Islamic topics—Brief Topics—Lesson 35: ruling on martyrdom operations in Palestine,’’ April 23, 2001, http://www.investigativeproject.org/documents/ 

misc/777.pdf#page=4, IPT translation from Arabic, alternate link in the Arabic archived from 

Nabulsi’s website: https://archive.is/c09tt (Accessed June 2, 2016). 28 ‘‘On Hamas’ Al-Aqsa TV: Muhammad Rateb Al-Nabulsi, Syrian Islamic Scholar Active in 

the U.S., Says Homosexuality is Filthy, ‘Leads To the Destruction of the Homosexual; That Is 

Why, Brothers, Homosexuality Carries the Death Penalty.’ ’’ Middle East Media Research Institute, May 19, 2011, http://www.memri.org/report/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/5296.htm (Accessed Feb. 

17, 2015). 

Abu Iyadh in August 2011.18 Similar statements led the administration of President 

Bill Clinton to ban Ghannouchi from entering the United States in 1994.19

Former President of the National Coalition of Syrian Revolution and Opposition 

Forces Ahmed Mouaz al-Khatib al-Hassani received a visa to enter the United 

States in March 2015. He met with Secretary of State John Kerry,20 U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Samantha Power21 and National Security Advisor Susan Rice.22

A review of his website Darbuna.net reveals a litany of statements supporting the 

Taliban,23 bin Laden 24 and 1983 Marine barracks bombing mastermind Imad 

Mugniyeh.25

State Department officials granted a visa sponsored by the Syrian American 

Council to Sheikh Mohammed Rateb Nabulsi in January 2014 26 even though he 

issued an April 2001 fatwa sanctioning Palestinian suicide bombings.27 Nabulsi also 

sanctioned the death penalty for LGBTs.28

CONCLUSION

U.N. Resolution 16/18, PSD–11 and the decisions based upon them fundamentally 

reshaped American foreign policy. The flawed and naı ̈ve analyses and the policies 

that sprang from them created conditions that fostered the rapid expansion of 

Islamist terror—specifically ISIS—and sent the Middle East and North Africa into 

barbaric turmoil. 

The reported enshrinement of PSD–11 as a new National security strategy initiated dramatic reversals of longstanding bipartisan agreement among lawmakers. 

With PSD–11 the administration engaged with radical Islamists who predictably 

took advantage of the opportunity to fundamentally transform the region and its 

threat environment rather than pursuing democratic reforms. 

Several questions remain unanswered that would help the country to better understand how radical Islam became such a dominating force in the world today. The 

Investigative Project on Terrorism suggests that Congress demand the following information: 

1. The contents of PSD–11. 

2. The criteria for vetting organizations in Libya, Iraq, Egypt, Syria, Afghanistan, and Yemen with which the U.S. Government would eventually partner. 

3. The groups and individuals that passed the vetting process. 

4. The names of the organizations and individuals responsible for vetting the 

new groups. 

5. Any and all assessments by the U.S. Government of the activities undertaken 

by these groups from 2012 to today. 

Members of Congress are responsible to the American people they represent to 

help them make sense of the dramatic change that the Obama administration imVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00048 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
45 

plemented in the Middle East, how they implemented it and how effective or ineffective its results may have been. 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair thanks the gentleman Mr. Hoekstra. 

The Chair now recognizes Dr. Jasser for an opening statement. 

STATEMENT OF M. ZUHDI JASSER, PRESIDENT, AMERICAN 

ISLAMIC FORUM FOR DEMOCRACY 

Dr. JASSER. Thank you, Chairman Perry and Members of the 

House Committee on Homeland Security’s Subcommittee on Oversight and Management for holding this important meeting on identifying the enemy in radical Islamist terror. I ask that my written 

testimony be entered into the record. 

Mr. PERRY. Without objection, so ordered. 

Dr. JASSER. As the president and founder of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy based in Phoenix, I am here because 

I could not feel more strongly that our current direction and our 

current strategy, or lack of strategy, is deeply flawed and profoundly dangerous for the security of our Nation. 

As a devout Muslim who loves my faith and loves my Nation, the 

concerted focus to de-emphasize the root causes of radical Islam or 

political Islamic supremacism, Sharia supremacism, is the root 

cause of the global war that we are in. 

Until we name this, and then once we can name it, treat it and 

counter it, we are going to continue this whack-a-mole program, 

which is failing day after day after day. The denial of truth is wedded to dishonesty from those who reject the need for reform within 

the house of Islam and the need to engage reformers. 

You will hear endless excuses, excuses as to why we should not 

use theopolitical terms which our enemies use to define themselves. 

You will hear the absurd and, I am sorry to say, un-American pleas 

for you to invoke blasphemy speech restrictions upon yourselves in 

the discourse in order to dishonestly avoid terms like Islamism, 

Islamist, Ummah, takfir, Islamic State, jihad, Salafism, 

Wahhabism. All these which are the way the enemy defines themselves, but also words that are necessary in order to know which 

pool these militants come from. 

The reason our homeland security is failing is because the pool 

that they are swimming in, they can’t look at the Omar Mateens 

of the world, the Dahar Dadan from Minneapolis, the Ahmad 

Rahimi. The ideas of political Islam, anti-Westernism, anti-Semitism are things that we should be monitoring, not taking away the 

rights of those communities but at least monitoring and profiling 

those ideas so that we know what the precursors are, because we 

know what those precursors are. 

It is a suspension of disbelief and a cognitive dissonance for 

Homeland Security to list for you Muslim partners and then say 

Islam, well, it has no problem. There is a suspension of disbelief 

when we say we engage Muslim groups, but yet Islam, Islamism 

isn’t related. Which is it? 

Either you don’t engage Muslim groups because Islam has nothing to do with it or Islamism has an issue within it, which is the 

problem ideology, so we need to engage Muslim groups. You can’t 

have it both ways. 

46 

You will hear terms like securitization, where somehow if the 

American public engages in a debate against theocracy, which is 

what our Founding Fathers did, that that will make us into this 

bigoted, anti-Muslim community. 

Well, we fought this battle before. We can engage with the right 

side of those who share our values within the Muslim community 

in order to make it clear what are those who do not share our values inside the Muslim community, that they should not be our allies. 

But once you say that anyone who is Muslim and is anti-terror 

is on our side, then you end up doing the bidding of theocracies like 

Iran and Saudi Arabia and Qatar and Egypt and other military dictatorships that are Sharia states that brew these radical ideas, 

that love to hear us just use contra and violent extremism because 

it allows them to continue to push the Sharia state ideology that 

is the drug that creates the ISISes of the world. 

So when you hear that in America this attempt to invoke blasphemy laws, it is actually doing the bidding of the elephant in the 

room, which is the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, the 

theocracies that love to see us not identify this as Islamism because the grassroots movement, the hope and the prayer of the 

Arab Awakening was about defeating dictatorships that were going 

to marginalize radicals, that were going to marginalize theocrats. 

But instead, we end up working with the arsonists as the firefighters. That is what happens when you work with the Saudis and 

the Muslim groups that Secretary Johnson went and spoke to. 

ISNA and other groups that we are catering to are also both the 

arsonists and the firefighters because they are distributing literature that glorifies political Islam, that glorifies Sharia state ideology. That ultimately ends up causing the harms that radicalize 

our community. 

We are ignoring movements like the Muslim Reform Movement. 

I would ask every one of you, left to right, if you truly believe in 

diversity, what is diversity in the Muslim community? It is not ethnic diversity or racial diversity. It is ideological diversity. 

When you say that well, we speak to the platform of the Islamic 

Society of North America, that is a monolithic, single ideology 

group that is based on an idea that is about clerics, men in beards 

that run the society and speak for Muslims across the country. 

That is not Muslim identification. Those are not groups that represent the majority of Muslims. Even Pew data has shown that 

they only represent 10 to 12 percent. The rest of us secularized 

Muslims that believe in the personal aspect of our faith are not 

represented in major movements in America. Our Muslim Reform 

Movement has been trying to engage government, media, academia 

to say that we want to reform against political Islam, and we need 

representation. That is who should be the partners. 

The reason this whack-a-mole program continues is because we 

have not been engaging in true reform for the separation of mosque 

and State. Instead we have been catering to the intoxicant of political Islam, which is the precursor ideology. 

So in closing, I want to leave you with recommendations. I think 

we need to transition immediately in Homeland Security, away 

from countering violent extremism. What you are going to hear is 

47 

already supposedly bigoted when, in fact, I don’t even know what 

that is. We need to transition to countering violent Islamism because that is what they call themselves, and that is what Arabs 

and Muslims across the Middle East are fighting. So it should be 

CVI. 

Second, the U.S. Government and academia and media need to 

include a broad spectrum of diverse voices. If you believe in diversity, have Muslims debate this publicly so that we aren’t just sortof marginalized to the lowest hanging fruit which is the OIC lobby 

in Washington which ends up speaking for all of our groups. 

It is time to stop engaging Muslim Brotherhood legacy groups 

and recognize their misogynist, anti-Semitic, homophobic, antiAmerican underpinnings. We must recognize they are not the only 

voice for American Muslims. We must make women’s issues and 

freedom of conscience and speech a litmus test when we work with 

these organizations. 

It is time to stop giving credence to the concerns of OIC dictatorships and instead have a long vision for the narratives that we are 

working with. As uncomfortable as it may be to speak the language 

of the enemy, they do call themselves Islamists and effectively separate themselves from other Muslims. 

I also ask that you reopen investigation into the Council on 

American Islamic Relations’ radical ties and their extensive domestic and foreign network because they represent sort-of an example 

of why these other groups were called unindicted co-conspirators 

and why that is so important. I ask that you no longer fear offending by using these terms. 

Those first oppressed by political Islam are Muslims, modern 

Muslims that are reformers. Without including us, homeland security depends upon your honesty in order for the American people 

to hold the rest of us accountable. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Dr. Jasser follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF M. ZUDHI JASSER

SEPTEMBER 22, 2016 

INTRODUCTION

Thank you Chairman Perry and Members of the House Committee on Homeland 

Security’s Subcommittee on Oversight and Management Efficiency for holding this 

very important hearing on ‘‘Identifying the Enemy: Radical Islamist Terror.’’ I am 

Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, president and founder of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) based in Phoenix, Arizona. I am here today, because I could not feel 

more strongly that our current National and agency direction in combating Islamist 

inspired terrorism is deeply flawed and profoundly dangerous. As a devout Muslim 

who loves my faith, and loves my Nation, the de-emphasis of ‘‘radical Islam’’ and 

the ‘‘Islamist’’ root cause of global Islamist terrorism is the greatest obstacle to both 

National harmony and National security. Wholesale denial of the truth by many in 

our Government and political establishment has actually emboldened extremists on 

both sides of this debate: Both radical Islamists and anti-Muslim fascists. 

Neither Islam nor Muslims are monolithic and should not be treated as such by 

anyone—much less our Government and media. Please understand it is as equally 

foolhardy in counter-terrorism and counter-radicalization work to refuse to acknowledge the role of political Islam in the threat as it is to villainize the whole of Islam 

and all Muslims. The majority of Americans are smart enough to understand that 

to say the House of ‘‘Islam has no problems’’ is just as problematic as declaring that 

‘‘Islam, and all Muslims, are the problem’’. I am here to tell you that our National 

security policy of refusing to say that ‘‘Islam currently has a problem’’ is dangerous. 

This surrender, which began just after 9/11, has chartered a course towards failure. 

48 

It has hamstrung our homeland security heroes from addressing any of the most 

central Islamist precursors of militant Islamists. If the agency actually emphasized 

the central role of radical Islamism and its attendant theopolitical ideologies, it 

would shift the entire axis of our agency apparatus toward once and for all beginning to actually address, expose, and engage the root cause of the theocratic strains 

of Islam (or Islamism) which would begin to make us safer. So-called Violent Extremism (VE) is simply an endpoint of a common supremacist ideology that at its root 

is theo-political and is a radicalization process that occurs over months to years and 

is far easier to publicly monitor than waiting for guess work on ‘‘Violent Extremism’’. 

The only way to right this deep misdirection is actually very simple. All we need 

to do is abandon the mantra of ‘‘Countering Violent Extremism’’ (CVE) and replace 

it with ‘‘Countering Violent Islamism’’ (CVI). I will show you today that change can 

only happen with an acknowledgement of the central role of ‘‘Radical Islam’’ or 

‘‘Islamism’’ in the root cause of the domestic and global security threat to the United 

States and the West. 

BACKGROUND ON AIFD, THE MUSLIM REFORM MOVEMENT, AND IMPORTANT

TERMINOLOGY

Our American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD) was founded in 2003 in the 

wake of the horrific attacks of September 11. For us it is a very personal mission 

to leave our American Muslim children a legacy that their faith is based in the 

unalienable right to liberty and to teach them that the principles that founded 

America do not contradict their faith but strengthen it. AIFD’s founding principle 

is that we as Muslims are able to best practice our faith in a society like the United 

States that guarantees the rights of every individual under God but blind to any 

one faith with no Governmental intermediary stepping between the individual and 

the creator to interpret the will of God. Because of this, our mission is explicitly 

to advocate for the principles of the Constitution of the United States of America, 

liberty and freedom through the separation of mosque and state. We believe that 

this mission from within the ‘‘House of Islam’’ is the only way to inoculate Muslim 

youth and young adults against radicalization. The ‘‘Liberty narrative’’ is the only 

effective counter to the ‘‘Islamist narrative.’’ 

AIFD is the most prominent American Muslim organization directly confronting 

and attempting to reform against the ideas of political Islam. We believe Muslims 

can openly counter the common belief that the Muslim faith is inextricably rooted 

to the concept of the Islamic state (Islamism). AIFD’s mission is derived from a love 

for America and a love of our faith of Islam. The theocratic ‘‘Islamic’’ regimes of the 

Middle East and many Muslim majority nations use their interpretations of Islam 

and ‘‘shar’ia’’ as a way to control Muslim populations. We believe as did America’s 

founding fathers that the purest practice of faith is one in which the faithful have 

complete freedom to accept or reject any of the tenants or laws of the faith no different than we enjoy as Americans in this Constitutional republic. We constantly 

ask that Americans not just observe what is happening inside the House of Islam 

but that you take the sides of the reformers, dissidents, and secularists against the 

theocratic Islamists. 

AIFD was founded on the premise that the root cause of Islamist terrorism is the 

ideology of political Islam and a belief in the preference for and supremacy of an 

Islamic state. Terrorism is but a means to that end. Most Islamist terror is driven 

by the desire of Islamists to drive the influence of the West (the ideas of liberty) 

out of the Muslim consciousness and Muslim majority societies. With almost a quarter of the world’s population Muslim, American security will never come without an 

understanding and winning out of the ideas of liberty by Muslims and an understanding of the harm of political Islam by non-Muslims. This will happen neither 

without identifying the enemy—radical Islamism—nor without identifying our allies—Muslims—who believe in liberty and reject theocracy. 

We work to engage Muslim youth and empower them with the independence to 

question the ideas of imams, clerics, and so many ‘‘tribal’’ leaders of Muslim communities unwilling to work toward reform and modernity. We empower Muslim youth 

to have the confidence to take personal intellectual ownership of their own interpretation of Islam, the Qur’an, Hadith (sayings of the Prophet Muhammad), and 

shariah (Islamic jurisprudence) and separate mosque and state. We work to advocate for the ideas of gender equality, genuine religious pluralism, and an unwavering preference of the secular state and a secular law over the Islamic state among 

other central ideas in modernity. 

Our mission is on the front lines of what is probably the most essential and yet 

contentious debate of the 21st Century. So it should be easy to understand why 

49 

1 Press Conference of the Launch of the Muslim Reform Movement, National Press Club, December 4, 2015: https://youtu.be/xlAnr8bIIr8. 

many Muslims may agree with our mission to separate mosque and state and 

marginalize political Islam, but yet want to remain private and out of the public 

eye as supporters. 

AIFD most recently convened and helped launch the Muslim Reform Movement 

(MRM) in December 2015 in Washington, DC.1 The Muslim Reform Movement is 

a coalition of over 15 Western Muslim Leaders (from the United States, Canada, 

and Europe) whose goal is to actively fight radical Islam from inside by confronting 

the idea of Islamism at its roots. The MRM has written a Declaration for Muslim 

Reform, a living document which was presented to all Islamic organizations, leaders 

and mosques across the United States in 2016 (Appendix 1A, 1B), with hopes of 

using its principles as a firewall to clearly separate radical Islamists from Muslims 

who believe in universal human rights. 

Not one iota of this work is possible in an environment where Government agencies and the American public writ large are unwilling to understand and engage 

Muslim groups domestically and abroad on their diverse interpretations of core 

terms, ideas, and movements. The attempts and policies of the Obama administration and its advisors to obstruct the use of terms which are central to the precursor 

characteristics of radicalized Muslims is willfully blind, negligent, and leaves us 

bare against the threat of radical Islamism. It renders our greatest allies within the 

Muslim community—genuine reformers—entirely impotent and marginalized. 

I ask that any official and unofficial U.S. Government moratorium on the use and 

understanding of the following terms and ideologies be immediately lifted. Let there 

at least be an on-going public debate about these terms. Let our analysts at least 

have the freedom to dare to understand the role of these theo-political ideas in the 

conveyor belt of radicalization. The suppression and censorship of these words and 

concepts by the U.S. Government in the public discourse on Muslim radicalization 

is simply un-American. It is surrender, and it is in fact dangerous. Our founding 

fathers were able to navigate a war of ideas against theocracy. We can do it again 

in the 21st Century. It is absurd to assert that since these terms are theo-political 

they are outside the domain of government all the while a militant domestic and 

global enemy is spreading forms of these ideas virally. I ask that the following 

terms and ideas become part of the fair domain of our security agencies. Our agency 

analysts and government experts are smart enough and fair enough to know that 

each of these terms carries with it a diverse set of interpretations from within the 

‘‘House of Islam’’ and that suppressing this essential debate hands the debate to our 

Islamist enemies. I submit the following terms and proposed definitions for the 

record in hopes that other Government agencies follow suit and rather than engaging Islamist apologists who obstruct and deny, that they instead begin engaging 

honest Muslims who are ready to confront the global radical movements that use 

them: 

A. Islam.—The faith tradition, its practice, and scriptures identified by over 1.6 

billion Muslims in the world. 

B. Islamism and Islamists.—The theo-political movement (Islamism) or party 

and its adherents (Islamists) who seek to establish Islamic states governed by 

shar’ia law in Muslim majority nations and institutions. 

C. Shar’ia.—Islamic theological jurisprudence as interpreted by Muslim jurists 

and clerics and practiced by Muslims. 

D. Jihad.—A holy war or armed struggle against unbelievers or enemies of an 

Islamic state. It can also mean spiritual struggle within oneself against sin. 

E. Wahhabism.—A Sunni Islamist movement based in a puritanical literalism 

and intolerance of any other interpretations or faith. A revivalist movement 

originated in the Najd of Arabia in the mid-19th century by Ibn Abdul Wahhab. 

It is the dominant strain of thought empowered by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Its ideas are central to the Salafi-jihadism of groups like Islamic State in 

Iraq and Syria (ISIS). 

F. Salafism.—Sunni Islamic fundamentalism which attempts to return normative Muslim practices to the literal ways of the Prophet Muhammad in the 

7th Century. Salaf literally means ‘‘companions of the Prophet’’. It is often synonymous with Wahhabism but is far more ubiquitous. Salafism, like 

Wahhabism deplores invention. 

G. Caliphate and Caliphism.—The theo-political ideology or desire by Islamists 

to re-establish the caliphate, a globally-unified Islamic governance of Islamic 

states which are led by a single caliph. 

H. Ummah.—The entire Muslim Faith community, but it can also mean the Islamic state. 

50 

2 Interim Report and Recommendations of the Homeland Security Advisory Council Countering 

Violent Extremism (CVE) Subcommittee of the US Department of Homeland Security. June 2016. 

[https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/HSAC/HSAC CVE Final Interim Report 

June 9 2016 508 compliant.pdf] 3 http://www.muslimreformmovement.org. 4 Gertz, Bill. DHS Report Calls for Rejecting Terms ‘Jihad’, ‘Sharia’ ’’. The Washington Free 

Beacon. June 17, 2016. [http://freebeacon.com/national-security/homeland-security-report-callsrejecting-terms-jihad-sharia/] 5 Interim Report and Recommendations of the Homeland Security Advisory Council Countering 

Violent Extremism (CVE) Subcommittee of the US Department of Homeland Security. June 2016. 

I. Islamic reform, Ijtihad.—Critical interpretation of scripture (exegesis) and Islamic jurisprudence in the light of modernity. 

J. Takfir.—The rejection (‘‘excommunication’’) of another Muslim from the faith 

community. The declaration of another Muslim as an apostate. 

To think that these words, these concepts and others are off-limits in the freest 

nation on earth, censored to our agencies, is just incredulous considering the growing threat we face today from violent Islamism. It smacks of a bizarre invocation 

of blasphemy laws in America. Violent manifestations of each of these above ideas 

is a natural byproduct of the intolerant non-violent underbelly of their beliefs. Any 

security apparatus unable or unwilling to connect the dots between the non-violent 

and violent manifestations of these ideologies is leaving us bare and will continue 

to miss the signs of radicalization. 

The latest recommendations from the Homeland Security Advisory Council ignorantly state the exact opposite recommending that only ‘‘plain American English 

words’’ be used and these terms be avoided.2

I hope and pray that my testimony today will open your eyes to how central the 

engagement of honest terminology is in demarcating who are our genuine allies 

from those who are or are working with our enemies abroad and the insurgents 

within. 

Personally, I will add that we are rendered entirely unarmed in our work at AIFD 

and in the Muslim Reform Movement in America, Canada, and Europe if we cannot 

engage our own faith community within the House of Islam on these ideas and if 

agencies cannot use these terms to look at precursor ideologies to ‘‘violent 

Islamism’’.3 All of the Muslim leaders in our Muslim Reform Movement would agree 

that looking just at ‘‘violent extremism’’ (VE) is too nebulous, nonspecific, and will 

result over and over in agency blinders to the attacks we have seen including the 

radical Islamist attacks at Fort Hood, Boston Marathon, Chattanooga, San 

Bernardino, and now Orlando. We cannot hold security agencies accountable to precursor ideologies and warning signs when those precursors are part of a continuum 

our agencies and media censor from the entire discourse. 

DEEMPHASIZING RADICAL ISLAM KEPT HOMELAND SECURITY AND THE AMERICAN PUBLIC

FROM SEEING THE COMMON PRECURSORS TO MANY RECENT ATTACKS ON OUR HOMELAND

In June 2016 a new report from the Homeland Security Advisory Council urged 

the rejection of Islamic terms such as ‘‘jihad’’ and ‘‘shar’ia’’ in programs aimed at 

countering terrorist radicalization among American youth while also calling for an 

additional $100 million in funding with private-sector cooperation.4 5 In the section 

on terminology, the report calls for rejecting use of an ‘‘us versus them’’ mentality 

by shunning Islamic language in CVE programs. It further recommends that DHS 

‘‘reject religiously charged terminology and problematic positioning by using plain 

meaning American English’’. Yet without the ability to target any of the precursor 

Islamist ideologies being identified it will continue to be a grotesquely inefficient 

whack-a-mole program centered simply on the all too vague symptom of ‘‘violent extremism’’ (CVE) rather than the disease of ‘‘violent Islamism’’ (CVI). 

I will next highlight a few obvious common denominators in recent attacks to illustrate how a shift in our agency and public discourse center of gravity from ‘‘countering violent extremism’’ (CVE) to ‘‘countering violent Islamism’’ (CVI) would go a 

long ways towards making us safer and giving meaning to ‘‘see something, say 

something’’. In every one of these cases, it is abundantly obvious that had security 

agencies been honed in on the continuum of radical Islam or ‘‘violent Islamism’’, had 

they as a matter of policy been held accountable for monitoring the non-violent precursor of Islamism (political Islam) which precedes ‘‘violent Islamism’’ then these 

massacres may have been far more likely prevented. 

51 

6 Jasser, M. Zuhdi and Leibsohn, Seth. The West’s Denial at Fort Hood. National Review. August 28, 2013 [http://www.nationalreview.com/article/356918/wests-denial-fort-hood-m-zuhdijasser-seth-leibsohn] (Accessed June 26, 2016). 7 Protecting the Force: Lessons from Fort Hood: Report of the DOD Independent Review. Secretary of Defense Dr. Robert M. Gates et. al. January 2010. [http://www.defense.gov/Portals/ 

1/Documents/pubs/DOD-ProtectingTheForce-WeblSecuritylHRl13Jan10.pdf] (Accessed June 

26, 2016). 

Fort Hood Massacre of November 5, 2009 6

Nidal Hasan’s case contains within it a microcosm of the entire domestic and global threat we face from jihadism and Islamism. If Americans cannot be kept safe 

from a Muslim terrorist inside an Army base in Texas, they cannot be kept safe 

anywhere. During his time at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and 

the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, before he was transferred 

to Ft. Hood, Major Hasan was exceedingly vocal in his opposition to the wars in Iraq 

and Afghanistan. He openly opposed those wars based on his religious (obvious theopolitical Islamist) views. But nothing was done. Two years before the Ft. Hood attack, Major Hasan gave a PowerPoint presentation at Walter Reed titled ‘‘Why the 

War on Terror Is a War on Islam.’’ But nothing was done. Some of his fellow officers 

complained about him to their superiors. But nothing was done. The PowerPoint 

contained statements from Hasan such as, ‘‘It’s getting harder and harder for Muslims in the service to morally justify being in a military that seems constantly engaged against fellow Muslims.’’ It contained violent interpretations from the Qur’an. 

And Hasan’s PowerPoint concluded with a quote from Osama bin Laden: ‘‘We love 

death more than you love life.’’ The following year, a group of fellow Army physicians met to ask themselves if they thought Hasan might be ‘‘psychotic.’’ ‘‘Everybody 

felt that if you were deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, you would not want Nidal 

Hasan in your foxhole,’’ said one. But nothing was done... except to transfer 

Hasan to Ft. Hood. 

And just as Hasan didn’t keep quiet at Walter Reed, neither did he hold his 

tongue at Ft. Hood. Hasan’s record at Ft. Hood includes telling his medical supervisor there that ‘‘she was an infidel who would be ‘ripped to shreds’ and ‘burn in 

hell’ because she was not Muslim.’’ But nothing was done. Nidal Hasan made personal business cards; they mentioned no affiliation with the United States military 

but underneath his name on the cards, listed his profession as ‘‘SOA,’’ or ‘‘Soldier 

of Allah.’’ But nothing was done. And, finally, Hasan was in frequent e-mail contact 

with Anwar al-Awlaki, the radical Muslim cleric who, even then, had been implicated in at least two other terrorist plots in America and had since fled to Yemen. 

But nothing was done. Indeed, taking all of this into account, it is difficult to imagine just what more Nidal Hasan could have done to broadcast his lethal views and 

intentions. 

After the slaughter, the chief of staff of the Army was asked about Muslims in 

the military and said, ‘‘Our diversity, not only in our army, but in our country, is 

a strength. And as horrific as this tragedy was, if our diversity becomes a casualty, 

I think that’s worse.’’ The Army’s top officer put a misplaced definition of ‘‘diversity’’ 

on a higher moral plane than innocent life. The politically correct ethic in the Army 

was one where any perceived threat against ‘‘ethnic’’ diversity in our military would 

be treated as worse than a threat against our troops, and our Nation, even on our 

homeland. Who would have thought such a postmodern view would take root in our 

Nation’s military? But it has. 

Even with the time for analysis and re-analysis and millions of dollars later, the 

Pentagon’s after-action report still gave support to this politically correct, multicultural triumph of ethics. In the 86 pages of the ‘‘Lessons from Fort Hood,’’ not once 

does the name Nidal Hasan get mentioned.7 Instead, he is referred to indeterminately, as ‘‘a gunman’’—just like any other random perpetrator of homicide. The 

word ‘‘Islam’’ appears once, and its appearance comes only in a buried endnote, in 

the title of one of many scholarly papers. The word ‘‘Muslim’’ appears nowhere in 

the report. Nor does the word ‘‘jihad.’’ This is blatant surrender resulting from a 

fratricidal obstinacy of naming and engaging our enemy’s Islamist ideologies. 

Chattanooga Recruiting Center Massacre of July 16, 2015 

Mohammod Youssuf Abdulazeez killed five marines and injured several others in 

what was a typical militant Islamist act of war inspired by the separatist ideology 

of Islamism. According to SITE Intelligence Group, a July 13, 2015 post state that 

‘‘life is short and bitter’’ and that Muslims should not let ‘‘the opportunity to submit 

to Allah... pass you by’’. In an entry on ‘‘Understanding Islam’’ he referred to 

the Prophet Muhammad’s companions nation that ‘‘almost every one of them was 

a political leader or an army general. Every one of them fought Jihad for the sake 

52 

8 Arutz Sheva Staff. Father of Tennessee Shooter was on Terrorist List. Israel National News. July 17, 2015 [http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/07/chattanooga-shooter-carlosbledsoe-120530]. 9 Kitfield, James. Tennessee is the Capital of American Jihad. Politico Magazine. July 23, 

2015. [http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/07/chattanooga-shooter-carlos-bledsoe120530]. 10 Boston: FBI admits missed warning signs over Tamerlan. The Scotsman. April 23, 2013. 

[http://www.scotsman.com/news/world/boston-fbi-admits-missed-warning-signs-over-tamerlan1-2905474]. 11 Mukasey, Michael B. Make No Mistake, It was Jihad. Wall Street Journal. April 21, 2013. 

[http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424127887324874204578436592210910044]. 12 Nomani, Asra. How the Saudis Churn out ‘Jihad Inc.’ .’’ The Daily Beast. January 4, 2016. 

[http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/01/05/how-the-saudis-churn-out-jihad-inc.html]. 13 It’s Salafi-Jiahdist Insurgency, Stupid! A policy briefing. Quilliam Foundation. January 28, 

2013. [http://www.quilliamfoundation.org/press/its-a-salafi-jihadist-insurgency-stupid/]. 14 Publicly released FBI News release from Tamp Field Office of phone call transcripts. June 

20, 2016. 

of Allah. We ask Allah to make us follow their path. To give us a complete understanding of the message of Islam, and the strength the live by this knowledge, and 

to know what role we need to play to establish Islam in the world.’’ These posts 

were only a few days prior to his attack upon the recruiting center but an agency 

following ‘‘Islamist’’ separatist movements would have picked up on his ‘‘jihad’’ and 

‘‘need to establish Islam’’. His father was on the FBI terrorist watch list for an unspecified period of time on suspicion of donating money to an organization suspected 

of being a terrorist front.8 The milieu of ideas and affiliations was clearly very 

Islamist and would have been on the radar of an agency following ‘‘violent 

Islamism’’ and its Islamist and jihadist precursors. James Kitfield described ‘‘Tennessee as the capital of American Jihad’’ for Politico noting that the first jihadist 

attack after 9/11 was committed by Carlos Bledsoe aka Abdulhakim Mujahid Mohammed.9 On June 1, 2009, Mohammed opened fire on a Little Rock Arkansas military recruiting office killing one service member and wounding another. 

The Boston marathon bombing 

The Islamist attack of April 13, 2013 committed by the Tsarnaev brothers was 

also rife with Islamist and jihadist warning signs that were ignored and should 

have been seen.10 Attorney General Michael Mukasey proclaimed ‘‘Make no mistake 

it was Jihad.11’’ Our agencies were hamstrung by no radar for Islamism or jihadism. 

The San Bernardino massacre was executed by a Jihadi couple Farook and 

Tafsheen Malik. DHS’s inappropriate axis of ‘‘violent extremism’’ left them off the 

radar. Asra Nomani, a co-founder of our Muslim Reform Movement, points out that 

their social media footprint is rife with Salafi-jihadi connections including most notably that Tafsheen had studied under Dr. Farhat of the Al-Huda International 

Salafi-jihadi (Taliban sympathetic) school based in Islamabad Pakistan. Nomani 

notes that ‘‘In the conveyor belt of radicalization, conservative Salafi doctrine is too 

often a gateway drug to violence—or what French political scientist Gilles Kepel 

coined as ‘‘Salafi jihadism’’.12 The Quilliam Foundation, a Muslim counterradicalization think tank in London, UK and co-founders of our Muslim Reform 

Movement published a report in 2013 titled, ‘‘It’s Salafi-Jihadist Insurgency, Stupid!’’ (Appendix 2)13

Orlando Pulse Night Club Massacre 

And in the militant Islamist attack of June 12, 2016 upon Orlando Pulse Night 

Club which left 49 dead and 53 injured, Omar Mateen’s declaration of allegiance to 

ISIS and its head, al-Baghdadi during his 9–1–1 call proves its Islamist separatist 

jihadist nature. He further told the FBI negotiator during calls that he was using 

the same vest as that used in France and he wanted ‘‘to tell America to stop bombing Syria and Iraq and that is why he was ‘out here right now’.’’14 His Islamism 

didn’t hatch overnight. The fact that the Obama administration’s reflex response 

was to redact the 9–1–1 call of any religious references speaks volumes to the obstacles engrained in the Executive branch to confronting the real problem. Later it was 

revealed that Mateen’s father was sympathetic to the Taliban and had a YouTube 

channel where he seemed to pretend or believe he was the President of Afghanistan. 

The fact that a gay night club was attacked is also central to the ideologies of political Islam (Islamism) and its persecution of minorities and dissidents. Violent 

homophobia is preceded by non-violent homophobia just like violent Islamism is preceded by non-violent Islamism. Again, it is appearing that all of the Islamist precursors within him and around him were ignored prior to Mateen becoming weaponized 

as a militant jihadist. 

53 

15 How Americans Feel About Religious Groups: Jews, Catholics and Evangelicals rated warmly, Atheists and Muslims more Coldly. Pew Research Center: Religion and Public Life. July 16, 

2014. [http://www.pewforum.org/2014/07/16/how-americans-feel-about-religious-groups/]. 

Islam has a problem or just a PR problem? 

This attempt by the Executive branch to ‘‘protect the image of Islam’’ is actually 

making Government agencies appear dishonest and dismissive to reform-minded 

Muslims who would be otherwise ready to take on the reality of the radical narrative of militant jihadists. Reformists like those of us at the Muslim Reform Movement see that the Islamist insurgents are at war with us and yet our own Government is telling us by denying the role of radical Islam to effectively sit down and 

be quiet with no need to fight back in this war of ideas within the House of Islam. 

In fact the avoidance of a discourse on Islam does not leave the Government neutral. It effectively hands the argument to the predominant power structure of the 

domestic and global Muslim faith community—the suffocating influence of petroIslam, the Wahhabi Islam of Saudi Arabia and the Islamist movement of the Muslim Brotherhood based out of Egypt and Qatar. 

Make no mistake this whole debate of this hearing is not only about the plight 

of American Muslims if we were to name the enemy but it is also about appeasement of a host of foreign Islamist regimes who our Government is afraid to critically 

engage on their supremacist shar’ia states. 

Denial fuels bigotry rather than quelling it 

If the reason for routinely publicly engaging Muslim leaders after acts of Islamist 

terror against Americans is simply to quell the fear of Americans, I will contend 

that the denial and obfuscation of the administration and the Muslims they engage 

does the exact opposite. Enabling the deep denial of the need for American Muslims 

to address the root causes of Islamist-inspired terrorism and its separatism actually 

fuels a growing fear of Muslims and Islam due to the administration’s choice for 

avoidance over transparency. Pew polling demonstrates that American feelings 

about Muslims is ‘‘cooler’’ than any other faith group scoring a 40 out of 100.15 In 

fact, there is nothing that would do more to melt away anti-Muslim bigotry to the 

extent that it exists than for Americans to see Muslims step away from denial and 

actually engaging and confronting the Jihad with their own jihad for liberty and 

against theocracy. We should be calling for a jihad against jihad rather than shielding Muslims and Americans from the tough love that they need. 

Bad advice 

The predominant Muslim advisors to the U.S. Government are obviously sympathetic to non-violent Islamism and demand that the United States see the problem 

through the lens of violent extremism only. I will address some case examples 

below. Conversely it is also a fact that as long as our Government and public discourse continues to deemphasize the role of Islam this policy avoidance behavior will 

be a natural attraction for Islamist sympathizers (radicalizers) and a natural repellant for genuine reformers (counter-radicalizers) who seek to modernize interpretations of Islam against the theocrats. 

Bipartisan blinders and false assumptions 

Both the Bush administration and the Obama administration have thus far erroneously felt that giving the radical Islamists air time for their Islamic theological 

verbiage will lend them credibility. From the time of Attorney General Gonzales, onward there have been significant attempts by the Department of Justice to control 

the lexicon used to describe radical Islamists, with repeated recommendations to 

avoid any religiously-charged terminology. The assumption that radical Islamists 

need our air time in order to brand themselves is false and it is more absurd to 

assume that their identity and branding can be defeated by ignoring it. In fact it 

requires the opposite—honest exposure, engagement, and marginalization. In fact 

the suppression of the truth of their Islamist identity is an obstacle to a whole host 

of policies and engagements which would be the beginning of their defeat. 

The power of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Lobby 

The OIC is the proverbial elephant in the room. The constant refrain from the 

Obama administration that the United States should not ‘‘declare war against 1.6 

billion Muslims and their governments’’ is related to global intimidation by the OIC 

sadly while ignoring the plight of Muslim and non-Muslim dissidents in their nations who lead the fight against Islamist movements. First, make no mistake. Across 

the Middle East and Muslim majority world, many leaders, scholars, and pundits 

call these individuals and their acts exactly what they call themselves—Islamists 

54 

16 Weiss, Deborah Esq. The Organization of islamic Cooperation’s Jihad on Free Speech. June 

6, 2015 [http://www.centerforsecuritypolicy.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/OIClFree- lSpeechlJihad.pdf]. 17 FoxNews.com. Homeland Secretary Johnson suggests term ‘violent extremism’ used at behest 

of Muslim leaders. February 22, 2015. [http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/02/22/ 

homeland-secretary-johnson-suggests-term-violent-extremism-used-at-behest.html]. 18 Hoskinson, Charles. Obama kept reform Muslims out of summit on extremism. Washington 

Examiner. February 21, 2015. [http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/obama-kept-reform-muslims-out-of-summit-on-extremism/article/2560525]. 19 Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) Working Group. Homeland Security Advisory Council. 

Spring 2010. [https://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/hsaclcvelworkinglgroup- lrecommendations.pdf]. 20 Gilligan, Andrew and Spillius Alex. Barack Obama adviser says Shar’iah law is misunderstood. The Telegraph. Oct. 8, 2009. [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/ 

barackobama/6274387/Obama-adviser-says-Sharia-Law-is-misunderstood.html]. 21 Gilgoff, Dan. White House Faith Advisor Defends Sharia Remarks. USNews.com. October 

22, 2009. [http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/god-and-country/2009/10/22/exclusive-whitehouse-faith-adviser-defends-sharia-remarks]. 

and jihadists. They know that they cannot publicly disengage the attendant Islamic 

theocratic platform of the political movements of Islamists like the Muslim Brotherhood or the Khomeinists. These political movements and the Islamist identity of 

states like the Islamic Republic of Iran or the Islamic Republic of Pakistan or the 

Wahhabism of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is the underbelly inspiring the militant 

movements like ISIS, Hamas, al-Qaeda, and Hizballah. However those Islamist governments exploit the militancy of jihadists in order to dictate the ruling form of 

Islam. 

It is imperative that the United States not be beholden to the deceptive narrative 

of the 56 member nations of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) regarding the root cause of the Islamist threat. These countries, and their OIC which is 

essentially a ‘‘neo-caliphate’’ are cauldrons of the precursor Islamist ideas which fuel 

these movements and until they experience regime change towards democracy will 

never acknowledge the role of the ‘‘shar’ia state’’ in radicalizing Muslims. The OIC 

nations hide behind the fac ̨ade of ‘‘countering violent extremism’’ all the while their 

governments fuel ‘‘violent Islamism’’. It is heartbreaking as an American Muslim to 

see my own American democratic government invoke OIC-like blasphemy law behaviors preventing the antiseptic of sunlight upon the Islamist ideas which 

radicalize our co-religionists. With our founders’ history in defeating theocracy, 

Americans are uniquely qualified to understand the battle against theocracy from 

within a faith. The best summary of the influence of the OIC upon our public discourse regarding Islam is Deborah Weiss’ monograph, ‘‘The Organization of Islamic 

Cooperation’s Jihad on Free Speech.’’16

How did we get here? Islamist Sympathizers within the administration 

DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson says that they use only the term ‘‘violent extremism’’ 

and have ‘‘purged radical Islam from official vocabulary at the request of Muslim 

leaders.’’17 These unnamed Muslim leaders must be Islamists since not one of our 

coalition of anti-Islamist Muslim leaders of the Muslim Reform Movement were included in any of the conversations that led to this policy and in fact Muslims publicly identified with DHS are known Islamist leaders.18

The initial efforts to push the CVE narrative began with the DHS ‘‘CVE Working 

Group’’ which published its suggestions in Spring 2010.19 Among some of the members of the working group were Dalia Mogahed, Mohamed Magid, and Mohamed 

Elibiary. A little review of their history will reveal how these American Islamists 

likely influenced the CVE narrative to the benefit of their own Islamist lobby. Dalia 

Mogahed at the time was one of two Muslim members of Obama’s faith advisory 

council. But just a few months prior to participating in the DHS CVE working 

group, Ms. Mogahed appeared on a British talk show sponsored by the extremist 

pro-Caliphate Islamist group, Hizb ut-Tahrir, where she explained that sharia law 

as practiced in the Islamic world are understood by the majority of Muslim women 

to represent ‘‘gender justice with sharia compliance.’’20 Mogahed later came out and 

apologized for appearing on the program, but still doubled-down on her remarks in 

support of sharia law.21 Her public positions have routinely denied even the existence of Islamism as an ideology while rejecting the voices and the need for reformers. Mohamed Magid at the time served as president of the Islamic Society of North 

America (ISNA). Magid’s inclusion in the DHS CVE Working Group is remarkable 

for the fact that just a few years prior, as Newsweek reported, the Attorney General 

of the United States was having to cancel outreach meetings solely for the reason 

55 

22 Isikoff, Michael. Justice Abruptly cancelled ‘Muslim Outreach Event’ ’’ Newsweek. August 7, 

2007. [http://www.newsweek.com/justice-abruptly-cancelled-muslim-outreach-event-99685]. 23 IPT News. The State Department’s Poor Choices of Muslim Outreach Emissaries. August 

27, 2010. [http://www.investigativeproject.org/2140/the-state-departments-poor-choices-of-muslim]. 

24 Ahmad, Ayesha. Muslim community members encourage coalition-building. IslamOnline.net. 

March 26, 2002. [https://web.archive.org/web/20021027152835/http://www.islam-online.net/ 

english/News/2002-04/10/article08.shtml]. 25 Program Circular of the Charitable Gift Fund. Charitable Giving the Muslim Way. 26 Affidavit in support of application for search warrant. US District Court for the Eastern 

District of Virginia. 27 Letter from Mohamed Majid to ADAMS All Dulles Area Muslim Society. Nov. 15, 2005. 

[http://web.archive.org/web/20060510074311/http://www.adamscenter.org/Content.asp?ID- 

=226]. 28 Munro, Neil. Obama’s Iftar guest list omits controversial attendees. Daily Caller. August 11, 

2011. [http://dailycaller.com/2011/08/11/obamas-iftar-guest-list-omits-controversial-attendees/ 

]. 29 Munro, Neil. Progressives, Islamists huddle at Justice Department. The Daily Caller. October 21, 2011. [http://dailycaller.com/2011/10/21/progressives-islamists-huddle-at-justice-department/]. 30 ISNA and Nat. Orgs meet with FBI Dir. To Discuss Biased FBI Training Materials. ISNA 

website. March 8, 2014. [http://web.archive.org/web/20120216025316/http:/www.isna.net/ 

articles/News/ISNA--Nat-Orgs-Meet-with-FBI-Dir-to-Discuss-Biased-FBI-Training-Materials.aspx]. 31 Kredo, Adam. Controversial DHS Adviser Let Go amid allegations of Cover Up. Elibiary 

let go after extremist rhetoric, claims he improperly used classified docs. The Washington Free 

Beacon. September 15, 2014. [http://freebeacon.com/issues/controversial-dhs-adviser-let-goamid-allegations-of-cover-up/]. 32 Kredo, Adam. DHS adviser tweets: America ‘‘an Islamic country’’: controversial adviser sympathetic to Muslim Brotherhood. The Washington Free Beacon. November 1, 2013. [http:// 

freebeacon.com/national-security/dhs-adviser-tweets-america-an-islamic-country/]. 33 Kredo, Adam. Senior DHS adviser: ‘‘Inevitable that Caliphate returns’’ The Washington Free 

Beacon. June 16, 2014. [http://freebeacon.com/national-security/senior-dhs-adviser-brags-inevitable-that-caliphate-returns/]. 34 Kredo, Adam. DHS Adviser’s Anti-America tweets celebrated by ISIS Terrorists. Elibiary’s 

controversial tweets coopted by terrorists. The Washington Free Beacon. June 19, 2014. 

[http://dailycaller.com/2013/10/06/homeland-security-advisor-supports-convicted-terroristfundraiser/]. 35 Johnson, Charles. Homeland Security Advisor supports convicted terrorist fundraiser. The 

Daily Caller. October 6, 2013. 36 DOJ press release. Federal Judge hands down sentences in Holy Land Foundation case. 

May 27, 2009. 

of the presence of Magid at the event.22 Several years prior, Magid was speaking 

at a forum at Georgetown University where he dismissed the on-going genocide in 

Darfur in his native Sudan, saying the multiple reports of genocide were an ‘‘exaggeration’’.23 In March 2002, Magid’s offices were raided as part of the Operation 

Greenquest investigation.24 25 26 Surprisingly, TIME Magazine hailed Magid as ‘‘An 

American Imam’’ who helped the FBI fight terrorism by reporting suspected extremists. And yet the very day the TIME article appeared touting his cooperation with 

the FBI, Magid sent an open letter to his mosque congregation telling them that 

he, in fact, did not report any suspected extremists to the FBI as the reporter had 

claimed (presumably told by Magid himself.27 Magid is a regular invitee to the annual Obama White House iftar celebrations, which curiously exclude any pro-liberty 

Muslim leaders, and yet his name has been left off the official published attendees 

list due to controversies surrounding the imam.28 He has also been at the forefront 

of many anti-liberty initiatives, such as calling for using anti-discrimination laws to 

target critics of Islam and limiting free speech 29 and urging the dubious ‘‘purge’’ 

of FBI counter-terrorism training materials.30

Mohamed Elibiary was another member of the DHS CVE Working group and a 

former member of the DHS Homeland Security Advisory Council until he was removed for controversial comments such as saying that America was an Islamic 

country and bragging about the inevitability of a resurrected Islamic caliphate.31 32

33 Those comments were cheered by ISIS recruiters on Twitter.34 But even at the 

time of his appointment to the DHS Homeland Security Advisory Council his extremist views were already well-known, such as his speech at a December 2004 

event honoring the rabidly anti-American Iranian Ayatollah Khomeini, an event 

that the Dallas Morning News editorialized as a ‘‘disgrace’’. Elibiary was also an enthusiastic public supporter of the Holy Land Foundation, which was closed by a 

Presidential Executive Order in December 2001 as a global terrorist financing organization that raised millions of dollars for Hamas.35 36 Despite the convictions, 

Elibiary continues to attack the prosecution and the decision of the U.S. Supreme 

56 

37 Elibiary, Mohamed. Verdict misinterprets ‘material support’ Dallas Morning News. June 24, 

2010. [dallasnews.com/opinion/commentary/2010/06/24/Mohamed-Elibiary-Verdict-misinterprets-4772]. 38 Dreher, Rod. Sayyid Qutb’s purpose driven life. The Dallas Morning News. August 28, 2006. 39 Elibiary, Mohamed. It’s a mistake to assassinate Anwar al-Awlaki. FoxNews.com. April 16, 

2010. [http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2010/04/16/mohamed-elibiary-alawlaki-assassinatemuslims-war-terror-nsc.html]. 40 Shane, Scott. The Lessons of Anwar al-Awlaki. New York Times Magazine. August 27, 2015. 41 Counterterrorism Policy. MACLC’s Critique of the NYPD’s Report on Homegrown Radicalism. Muslim American Civil Liberties Coalition. CAIR–NY. Fauzia N. Ali, Sarah SAYEED, 

Aliya Latif. 2008. 42 Silber, Mitchell D. And Bhatt, Arvin. Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat. 

NYPD Intelligence Division. Police Department, City of New York. 2007. [http:// 

sethgodin.typepad.com/sethslblog/files/NYPDlReport-RadicalizationlinlthelWest.pdf] 

(Accessed June 26, 2016). 43 Kredo, Adam. Court Requires NYPD to Purge Docs on Terrorists Inside U.S. The Washington Free Beacon. January 18, 2016. [http://freebeacon.com/national-security/court-requiresnypd-purge-docs-terrorists-inside-us/]. 44 Merley, Steven. The Muslim Brotherhood in the United States. Center on Islam, Democracy 

and the Future of the Muslim World. Hudson Institute. 2009. 

Court upholding the statute criminalizing the material support for terrorism.37 Prior 

to his appointment by Janet Napolitano to his DHS position he publicly feuded with 

a Dallas Morning News editor in defense of hardline jihadist ideologue Sayyid Qutb, 

who the 9/11 Commission found was one of the most important influences in shaping Osama bin Laden’s worldview.38 39 40

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the Muslim Public Affairs 

Council (MPAC) are two of the many Muslim Brotherhood legacy groups in America. 

They have typically generically renounced the use of terror and violence, but they 

have never taken a public position against the ideology of Political Islam (Islamism) 

and have as a matter of policy sought to obstruct any emphasis on the role of ‘‘radical Islam’’ and Islamism in radicalization. They both have also been some of the 

primary antagonists to efforts by law enforcement to understand and mitigate the 

real stages of radicalization of Muslims in America. 

In 2007, under the umbrella of the Muslim American Civil Liberties Coalition 

(MACLC), CAIR–NY and MPAC–NY authored ‘‘Counterterrorism policy, MACLC’s 

critique of the NYPD’s report on homegrown radicalism.’’41 The paper is a response 

to NYPD’s report ‘‘Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat.’’42 In it, the 

organizations lay out their belief that, ‘‘The study of violent extremism, however, 

should decouple religion from terror to safeguard civil liberties on free speech and 

equal protection grounds as a matter of strong public policy.’’ These Islamist groups 

then spearheaded a successful effort to purge the NYPD of their seminal counterterrorism documents endorsed by our Muslim Reform Movement. As part of a settlement agreement the NYPD was forced to remove the publication from its database 

and got not to rely on it in the future.43 I have attached the full report of the NYPD 

Report on ‘‘Radicalization in the West: the Homegrown Threat,’’ because of the value 

it serves (Appendix 3). This effort by American Islamist groups is emblematic of the 

role they have played inside and outside of Government in suppressing American 

understanding of the radical Islam. CAIR was revealed in the The Holy Land Foundation trial as part of a network of Islamist organizations in the United States 

which grew out of American sympathizers with the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt. 

The father of them all is the Muslim Students’ Association and from it has sprouted 

a whole host of Muslim Brotherhood legacy groups in America. Steven Merley describes the Muslim Brotherhood network in the United States in his monograph.44

Salam al-Marayati, president of the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC), is one 

of the closest Muslim advisers to the White House and is reportedly playing a crucial role in advising the Department of Homeland Security on its ‘‘countering violent 

extremism’’ (CVE) policies. Marayati was one of the invited participants in President Obama’s February 2015 White House Summit on Countering Violent ExtreVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00060 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
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45 McCarthy, Andrew. C. Find the ‘‘Countering Violent Extremism Summit’’ at the Intersection 

of Islamists and Leftists. National Review. February 19, 2015. [http://www.nationalreview.com/ 

corner/414064/find-countering-violent-extremism-summit-intersection-islamists-and-leftists-andrew-c]. 46 Kredo, Adam. Muslim Leader who called Israel a ‘suspect’ after 9/11 meets with Biden at 

White House’’ The Washington Free Beacon. February 18, 2015. [http://freebeacon.com/ 

national-security/muslim-leader-who-called-israel-a-suspect-after-911-meets-with-biden-at-whitehouse/]. 47 Twitter. MPAC February 17, 2015 [https://twitter.com/mpaclnational/status/ 

567785207940792320]. 48 2010 White House Iftar. MPAC website. August 14, 2010. [http://www.mpac.org/ 

multimedia-old/photos-old/2010-white-house-iftar.php] August 11, 2011. [http:// 

www.mpac.org/programs/government-relations/white-house-iftar-dinner-attended-by-haristarin-mpacs-director-of-the-dc-office.php] August 16, 2012. [http://www.mpac.org/programs/ 

government-relations/mpac-board-chair-reflects-on-attending-white-house-iftar.php] June 23, 

2015 [http://www.mpac.org/blog/meeting-the-president-at-the-white-house-iftar.php]. 49 MPAC website. MPAC Partners with the White House Hosting Groundbreaking Women’s 

Forum. April 17, 2014. [http://www.mpac.org/issues/womens-empowerment/mpac-partnerswith-the-white-house-hosting-groundbreaking-womens-forum.php]. 50 FBI Community Outreach Partners. (Accessed June 27, 2016). 51 MPAC website. MPAC President Speaks at Roundtable with Hillary Clinton. March 25, 

2016. [http://www.mpac.org/policy-analysis/mpac-president-discusses-partnership-with-hillaryclinton.php] Video [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ullWYnM3wbY]. 52 Goodstein, Laurie. Gephardt Bows to Jews’ Ange over a Nominee. New York Times. July 

9, 1999. Also see CNN [http://web.archive.org/web/20081211110250/http:/www.cnn.com/ 

ALLPOLITICS/stories/1999/07/29/terrorism.commission/index.html]. 53 Does Salam al-Marayati Support Terrorism? You make the call. The Journal of Counterterrorism and Security International. July 9, 1999 [http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ 

does-salam-al-marayati-support-terrorism-you-make-the-call-73539887.html]. 54 McCarthy, Andrew. MPAC History. National Review. August 7, 2012 [http:// 

www.nationalreview.com/article/313257/history-mpac-andrew-c-mccarthy]. 55 ADL New Blood Libel: Jews Accused of Harvesting Organs. MPAC [http://archive.adl.org/ 

nr/exeres/a3d52d61-a5a0-46a4-96c2-6abcb54d33ca,8c8c250f-da79-405f-b716-d4409cab5396,- 

frameless.html]. 56 MPAC website. Israel Admits Harvesting Palestinian organs. December 21, 2009 [http:// 

www.mpac.org/programs/government-relations/mpac-represents-us-government-at-humanrights-conference.php]. 57 Kredo, Adam. Anti-Israel Advocate Reps U.S. At Rights Conference. MPAC represents. The 

Washington Free Beacon. October 3, 2012 58 MPAC website. MPAC Represents US Government at human rights conference. 59 Kredo, Adam. State Department stands by their man. The Washington Free Beacon. October 

4, 2012 [http://freebeacon.com/national-security/state-stands-by-its-man/]. 60 Marayati, Salam. The Wrong Way to Fight Terrorism. LA Times. October 19, 2011 [http:// 

articles.latimes.com/2011/oct/19/opinion/la-oe-almarayati-fbi-20111019]. 

mism.45 46 47 48 In April 24, 2014, the White House and MPAC co-hosted a forum 

on American Muslim women.49 MPAC is also identified by the FBI as one of its official ‘‘outreach’’ partners.50 This has carried over into the Clinton campaign. On 

March 2016, Marayati participated in a roundtable event with Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton 51 Marayati’s close association with the Hillary 

Clinton campaign is noteworthy in that during her husband’s administration, 

Marayati had his nomination to a U.S. Government terrorism commission withdrawn by House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt after criticism from former FBI 

Counterterrorism Section Chief Steven Pomerantz and Jewish groups who noted his 

open support for Hamas and Hezbollah52 In a press release by the Journal for 

Counterterrorism and Security International documented MPAC and Marayati’s 

long-time support for terrorism and public defense of terrorism suspects.53 That support for extremism continues up until today. In 2010, former Federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy documented Marayati and MPAC’s long history of extremism.54 55

56 In October 2012, the State Department has also selected Marayati to represent 

the United States as part of the official delegation to a 10-day OSCE human rights 

conference.57 58 After protests by Jewish groups about his appointment to the delegation, a State Department spokesman defended Marayati, calling him ‘‘valued and 

highly credible’’.59 Perhaps most perplexing in light of his previous removal from the 

Clinton administration terrorism commission is the role that MPAC has played in 

directing the Obama administration to purge counter-terrorism training and trainers who discuss the role of radical Islam. To that end, Marayati penned an op-ed 

in the LA Times threatening that non-compliance by National security and law enforcement agencies to conduct such a ‘‘purge’’ endangered their relationship with the 

administration.60 Marayati’s organization signed their name to a letter to thenVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00061 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
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61 Muslim Advocates website. Letter to DHS John Brennan on FBI use of biased experts and 

training materials. [https://www.muslimadvocates.org/letter-to-dhs-john-brennan-on-fbis-use-ofbiased-experts-and-training-materials/]. 62 DHS Readout. Readout of Secretary Napolitano’s Meeting with Faith-Based and Community 

Leaders. January 28, 2010. [https://www.dhs.gov/news/2010/01/28/readout-secretarynapolitanos-meeting-faith-based-and-community-leaders]. 63 Judicial Watch Investigative Bulletin. DHS Secretary Napolitano and Controversial Islamic 

Community Leaders’ Meeting Documents. December 9, 2011. [http://www.judicialwatch.org/ 

bulletins/dhs-secretary-napolitano-and-controversial-islamic-]. 64 Johnson, Charles. Homeland Security guidelines advise deference to pro-Shar’iah Muslim 

Supremacists. The Daily Caller. May 17, 2013. [http://dailycaller.com/2013/05/17/homelandsecurity-guidelines-advise-deference-to-pro-sharia-muslim-supremacists/]. 65 ACLU Files USA v. Holy Land Foundation CR No. 3:04–CR–240–P. [https://www.aclu.org/ 

sites/default/files/images/assetluploadlfile142l36171.pdf#page=13]. 66 Gerstein, Josh. Islamic Groups named in Hamas Funding Case. NY Sun. June 4, 2007. 

[http://www.nysun.com/national/islamic-groups-named-in-hamas-funding-case/55778/]. 67 Crime Blog. FBI: CAIR is a front group, and Holy Land Foundation tapped Hamas clerics 

for fundraisers. Dallas Morning News. Oct. 7, 2008 [http://crimeblog.dallasnews.com/2008/10/ 

fbi-cair-is-a-front-group-and.html/]. 68 Abrams, Joseph. FBI Cuts ties to CAIR following terror financing trial. FoxNews.com. January 30, 2009. [http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/01/30/fbi-cuts-ties-cair-following-terrorfinancing-trial.html]. 69 Judge’s ruling on Islamic Group made public. Politico.com [http://www.politico.com/blogs/ 

under-the-radar/2010/11/judges-ruling-on-islamic-groups-as-unindicted-co-conspirators-madepublic-030922]. 70 Peter King questions decision not to prosecute CAIR. Politico [http://www.politico.com/ 

blogs/under-the-radar/2011/04/peter-king-questions-decision-not-to-prosecute-cair-others035104]. 71 Terror Reviews avoid word ‘‘Islamist’’. Washington Times. February 12, 2010. [http:// 

www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/feb/12/violent-extremists-but-not-islamists/]. 72 End to Loaded Islamic terms welcomed. [http://www.upi.com/ToplNews/Special/2010/ 

04/08/End-to-loaded-Islamic-terms-welcomed/23761270739326/]. 73 Hanchett, Ian. CAIR Comm Director: Term ‘‘Islamists’’ used as pejorative. Breitbart.com Jan 

19, 2015. [http://www.breitbart.com/video/2015/01/19/cair-comm-director-term-islamists-usedas-pejorative/]. 

White House Counterterrorism czar John Brennan demanding such a purge.61 One 

of the most telling events was the 2-day DHS Muslim engagement meeting held in 

late January 2010 marking the escalation of engagement with United States 

Islamist groups.62 The discussion between DHS officials on who to invite uncovered 

by a Judicial Watch FOIA request on the meeting shows that many of the attendees 

came from Muslim Brotherhood-aligned organizations.63 The results of this meeting 

established the Obama administration’s policy of embracing Islamist groups in favor 

of more reform-minded Islamic organizations. This policy was officially established 

in 2011 when DHS civil Rights and Civil Liberties circulated a memorandum, 

‘‘Countering Violent Extremism Dos and Don’ts,’’ that expressly warns local and National law enforcement agencies against using moderate Muslim ‘‘trainers who are 

self-professed ‘Muslim reformers’ ’’ because they ‘‘may further an interest group 

agenda instead of delivering generally accepted, unbiased information.’’64

CAIR 

One of the most obvious beneficiaries of this embrace of Islamist groups has been 

the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). During the 2007–2008 Holy 

Land Foundation terrorism financing trial, CAIR was directly implicated by Federal 

prosecutors in the Muslim Brotherhood’s U.S. Palestine Committee conspiracy to 

provide ‘‘media, money, and men’’ to Hamas.65 During the course of the trial it was 

reported that CAIR, among other U.S. Islamic groups including ISNA, had been 

named unindicted co-conspirator in the case.66 During the trial itself, FBI Special 

Agent Lara Burns testified under oath that CAIR was a front group for Hamas.67

Just weeks after the jury in the Holy Land Foundation case found the defendants 

guilty on all counts, the FBI quietly announced a policy to not have any official contact with CAIR.68 69 70

When the Obama administration began deleting the term ‘‘Islamist’’ from usage 

in defense and National security policy documents in favor of ‘‘violent extremists,’’ 

CAIR publicly cheered the change.71 72 More recently it has tried to eliminate the 

use of ‘‘Islamist’’ in public discourse, particularly the media, which ends up 

conflating the hardcore political Islam ideology embraced by CAIR, ISNA, and other 

more extreme Islamic groups from more mainstream interpretations.73 CAIR took 

a lead in publicly attacking U.S. Government counter-terrorism training, signing 

onto the October 2011 demand letter sent to the White House by 57 Islamic groups 

demanding a training ‘‘purge.’’ During the investigation into the dozens of young Somali men who had left the Minneapolis area to travel to Somalia to fight with the 

59 

74 Somalis take to the street to protest group’s actions.. Star Tribune.com June 12, 2009 

[http://www.hiiraan.com/news4/2009/Jun/11060/somalisltakeltolthelstreetltolprotestlgrouplslactions.aspx]. 75 Rep. Peter King’s Anti-Muslim Congressional Hearings. CAIR.com June 2012. 

[https://www.cair.com/14-islamophobia/11638-rep-peter-king-s-anti-muslim-congressional-hearings.html]. 76 Starnes, Todd. CAIR Says Poster Warning against helping FBI is Misinterpreted. 

Foxnews.com. Jan. 13, 2011. [http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/01/13/cair-says-anti-fbi-postermisinterpreted.html]. 77 Review of FBI interactions with CAIR. US Department of Justice. September 2013. [http:// 

www.investigativeproject.org/4165/wolf-demands-fbi-punish-agents-for-cair-contact]. 78 IPT News. Wolf Demands FBI Punish Agents for CAIR Contact. Investigative Project on Terrorism. September 19, 2013. [http://www.investigativeproject.org/4165/wolf-demands-fbi-punish-agents-for-cair-contact]. 79 Munro, Neil. Pelosi holds secret fundraiser with Islamists, Hamas-linked groups. The Daily 

Caller. Nov. 2, 2012. [http://dailycaller.com/2012/11/02/pelosi-holds-secret-fundraiser-withislamists-hamas-linked-groups/]. 80 Munro, Neil. Administration admits to ‘‘hundreds’’ of meetings with jihad-linked group. The 

Daily Caller. June 8, 2012. [http://dailycaller.com/2012/06/08/administration-admits-to-hundreds-of-meetings-with-jihad-linked-group/]. 81 UAE publishes list of terrorist organizations. Gulf News. November 15, 2014. [http:// 

gulfnews.com/news/uae/government/uae-publishes-list-of-terrorist-organisations-1.1412895]. 82 US Govt pledges to work with CAIR, MAS on UAE Designation. CAIR.com Dec. 22, 2014. 

[http://www.cair.com/press-center/press-releases/12783-us-government-pledges-to-work-withcair-mas-on-uae-designation.html]. 

al-Shabaab terror group, friends and relatives of the missing men publicly accused 

CAIR of interfering in the investigation and protested CAIR’s attempts to silence 

family members from asking questions about how their loved ones had been recruited.74

Both CAIR and MPAC attacked me and other Muslim reformers including Asra 

Nomani and Qanta Ahmed in the prelude leading up to our testimony on Muslim 

Radicalization to the Homeland Security Committee of the House in March 2011. 

In a form of subtle takfirism, never dealing with the substance of our testimony, 

they cast the hearings which included only Muslim witnesses in the first panel for 

the Republicans as ‘‘Rep. Peter King’s Anti-Muslim Congressional Hearings.’’75

The group also came under fire in January 2011 when one of its local affiliates 

circulated a poster ominously warning the Muslim community, ‘‘Don’t talk to the 

FBI.’’ They predictably claimed that the poster had been ‘‘taken out of context.’’76

Despite the open hostility from CAIR and in violation of stated FBI policy, several 

FBI field offices flagrantly violated the ban on official contact with CAIR a Justice 

Department Inspector General investigation found.77 Members of Congress called 

for punishment for FBI officials who defied the CAIR official contact ban, which 

never came.78 The Obama administration and top Democratic Party leaders also 

failed to follow the direction of the FBI to stay away from CAIR, with top CAIR 

officials directly implicated in the Holy Land Foundation case showing up at party 

fundraisers.79 A senior White House official admitted that the administration had 

‘‘hundreds’’ of meetings with CAIR despite the FBI official contact policy ban.80 In 

November 2014, the United Arab Emirates named CAIR and another U.S. Islamic 

group, the Muslim American Society, as terrorist organizations as part of their ban 

on international Muslim Brotherhood groups.81 While CAIR may eschew violence of 

many Islamist groups, this designation speaks to their known common ideological 

streaming across the Middle East and OIC with Islamist movements like the Muslim Brotherhood.82 The unashamed empowerment, embrace, and rehabilitation of 

CAIR by the Obama administration in the face of a continued rejection by the FBI 

and CAIR’s direct complicity in supporting terrorism as successfully argued by Federal prosecutors in Federal court has come at the expense of the influence of more 

mainstream Islamic organizations like our Muslim Reform Movement in shaping 

U.S. Government counterterrorism policies and community engagement. 

CONCLUSION: SHIFT GLOBALLY FROM COUNTERING VIOLENT EXTREMISM (CVE) TO

COUNTERING VIOLENT ISLAMISM (CVI)

The importance of identifying the theo-political precursors of militant Islamists 

could not be more clear to our security and our domestic and global counter-terrorism strategy. Any attempt to purge the discourse of an understanding of the 

Islamist precursors is dishonest, empowers the Islamist movements domestically 

and abroad, and marginalizes our greatest allies—reform-minded anti-Islamist Muslims. De-emphasizing radical Islam keeps our security agencies in the dark while 

Islamist precursor warnings are ignored in the public. The de-emphasis makes us 

far more vulnerable than we should be and it also is a primary obstacle to enabling 

60 

the very reforms and reformers that would otherwise bring forth the end of radical 

Islamism. Every massacre from Fort Hood to Boston to Chattanooga to San 

Bernardino and now Orlando is fraught with commonalities and lessons we ignore 

at our own plight. We must treat our Muslim communities with a tough love. I give 

the following recommendations: 

1. Transition immediately from a center of gravity on ‘‘Countering Violent Extremism’’ (CVE) to one centered on ‘‘Countering Violent Islamism’’ (CVI). 

2. The U.S. Government and public discourse (academia, NGO’s, and media) 

must include a broad spectrum of ideologically diverse voices in the Muslim 

community. It is time to end the un-democratic ban on any theological terms 

and with that also end the marginalization of reform-minded Muslims most notably the bipartisan group of Muslim leaders of the Muslim Reform Movement. 

3. It is time to stop engaging Muslim Brotherhood legacy groups in Government 

and media and recognize their misogynist, anti-Semitic, homophobic, and antiAmerican ideological underpinnings. We must recognize that they are not the 

only voice for American Muslims. We must make women’s issue and freedom 

of conscience a litmus test. These groups, when pressed, will fail. 

4. It is time to stop giving credence to the concerns of OIC dictatorships about 

our word choices and counter-radicalization strategies. Our real allies abroad 

are the free thinkers in their prisons not in their palaces. 

5. As uncomfortable as it may be to speak the language of the enemy, they do 

call themselves Islamists and effectively separate themselves from other Muslims. We must identify them as Islamists drawing a clear line. 

6. I ask that you re-open the investigation into CAIR’s radical ties, and into 

their extensive domestic and foreign network of foundations and poorly-hidden 

branches. 

7. I ask that you no longer fear offending by using these terms. Those oppressed 

by Islamism—including many Muslims—depend on your honesty. Homeland security depends upon your honesty in order for the American people to hold them 

accountable to the natural precursors of violent Islamism. 

APPENDIX 1.—STATEMENT OF THE MUSLIM REFORM MOVEMENT

May 27, 2016 

Dear Brothers and Sisters: 

Assalamu aleikum wa ramatullahi wa baraktuhu. We write as fellow Muslims 

concerned with the state of our community, and of the broader ummah—humankind. Like you, our faith is very important to us. Important enough that we wish 

to seek solutions to the problems facing our community so that peace and mercy 

prevail. 

Tragically, our community is plagued with problems—problems we can no longer 

minimize and certainly cannot ignore. Assuring those who are not Muslim that the 

problems we face have ‘‘nothing to do with Islam’’ doesn’t just fail to solve these 

problems. This response shirks our responsibility to address crises within our communities and actually promotes tensions between ourselves and others. Ultimately, 

denial and inaction also promote anti-Muslim bigotry. 

Now is the time to act. As violence continues to be carried out in the name of 

our faith—from Paris to Beirut and Nigeria, from city squares to family homes— 

our moral courage and fortitude are more important than ever. As faithful Muslims 

committed to universal human rights, and the principles of mercy and peace, we invite you to sign onto our declaration for Muslim reform. 

This declaration, which we attach, is being sent to Muslim leaders in America and 

around the world. It is a public statement in support of gender equality, non-violence, secular governance and authentic social justice. 

The list of fellow Muslims to whom we are sending this letter will be made available to the public, as will responses and the names of signatories to the declaration. 

We look forward to your support and public commitment to these values. Please respond at the email and snail mail addresses below. 

Sincerely yours, 

FOUNDERS OF THE MUSLIM REFORM MOVEMENT. 

61 

Preamble 

We are Muslims who live in the 21st Century. We stand for a respectful, merciful, 

and inclusive interpretation of Islam. We are in a battle for the soul of Islam, and 

an Islamic renewal must defeat the ideology of Islamism, or politicized Islam, which 

seeks to create Islamic states, as well as an Islamic caliphate. We seek to reclaim 

the progressive spirit with which Islam was born in the 7th Century to fast forward 

it into the 21st Century. We support the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 

which was adopted by United Nations member states in 1948. 

We reject interpretations of Islam that call for any violence, social injustice, and 

politicized Islam. Facing the threat of terrorism, intolerance, and social injustice in 

the name of Islam, we have reflected on how we can transform our communities 

based on three principles: Peace, human rights, and secular governance. We are announcing today the formation of an international initiative: The Muslim Reform 

Movement. 

We have courageous reformers from around the world who have written our Declaration for Muslim Reform, a living document that we will continue to enhance as 

our journey continues. We invite our fellow Muslims and neighbors to join us. 

Declaration 

A. Peace: National Security, Counterterrorism, and Foreign Policy 

1. We stand for universal peace, love, and compassion. We reject violent jihad. 

We believe we must target the ideology of violent Islamist extremism, in order 

to liberate individuals from the scourge of oppression and terrorism both in 

Muslim-majority societies and the West. 

2. We stand for the protection of all people of all faiths and non-faith who seek 

freedom from dictatorships, theocracies, and Islamist extremists. 

3. We reject bigotry, oppression, and violence against all people based on any 

prejudice, including ethnicity, gender, language, belief, religion, sexual orientation, and gender expression. 

B. Human Rights: Women’s Rights and Minority Rights 

1. We stand for human rights and justice. We support equal rights and dignity 

for all people, including minorities. We support the United Nations Declaration 

of Human Rights. 

2. We reject tribalism, castes, monarchies, and patriarchies and consider all 

people equal with no birth rights other than human rights. All human beings 

are born free and equal in dignity and rights. Muslims don’t have an exclusive 

right to ‘‘heaven.’’ 

3. We support equal rights for women, including equal rights to inheritance, 

witness, work, mobility, personal law, education, and employment. Men and 

women have equal rights in mosques, boards, leadership, and all spheres of society. We reject sexism and misogyny. 

B. Secular Governance: Freedom of Speech and Religion 

1. We are for secular governance, democracy, and liberty. We are against political movements in the name of religion. We separate mosque and state. We are 

loyal to the nations in which we live. We reject the idea of the Islamic state. 

There is no need for an Islamic caliphate. We oppose institutionalized sharia. 

Sharia is man-made. 

2. We believe in life, joy, free speech, and the beauty all around us. Every individual has the right to publicly express criticism of Islam. Ideas do not have 

rights. Human beings have rights. We reject blasphemy laws. They are a cover 

for the restriction of freedom of speech and religion. We affirm every individual’s right to participate equally in ijtihad, or critical thinking, and we seek a 

revival of ijtihad. 

3. We believe in freedom of religion and the right of all people to express and 

practice their faith, or non-faith, without threat of intimidation, persecution, 

discrimination or violence. Apostasy is not a crime. Our ummah—our community—is not just Muslims, but all of humanity. 

We stand for peace, human rights, and secular governance. Please stand with us! 

Affirmed this Fourth Day of December, Two-Thousand and Fifteen by the founding authors who are signatories below 

62 

* The attachment is retained in Committee files and is available at http:// 

www.quilliamfoundation.org/press/its-a-salafi-jihadist-insurgency-stupid/. 

FOUNDING SIGNATORIES

TAHIR GORA

Author, Journalist, Activist, Toronto, Canada 

TAWFIK HAMID

Islamic Thinker and Reformer, Oakton, VA, USA 

USAMA HASAN

Imam, Quilliam Foundation, London, UK 

ARIF HUMAYUN

Senior Fellow, American Islamic Forum for Democracy, Portland, OR, USA 

FARAHNAZ ISPAHANI

Author, Former Member of Parliament, Pakistan, Washington, DC, USA 

M. ZUHDI JASSER, M.D. 

President, American Islamic Forum for Democracy, Phoenix, AZ USA 

NASER KHADER

Member, Danish Parliament, Muslim democracy activist, Copenhagen, Denmark 

COURTNEY LONERGAN

Community Outreach Director, American Islamic Forum for Democracy, 

Professional facilitator 

HASAN MAHMUD

Resident expert in sharia, Muslims Facing Tomorrow, Toronto, Canada 

ASRA NOMANI

Journalist, Author, Morgantown, WV, USA 

RAHEEL RAZA

Founder, Muslims Facing Tomorrow, Toronto, Canada 

SOHAIL RAZA

Vice President, Coalition of Progressive Canadian Muslim Organizations 

SALMA SIDDIQUI

President, Coalition of Progressive Canadian Muslim Organizations, Toronto, 

Canada 

. . . affirmed at 8 AM this Fourth Day of December, Two-Thousand and Fifteen 

APPENDIX 2.—‘‘IT’S SALAFI-JIHADIST INSURGENCY, STUPID!’’, A POLICY BRIEFING BY

QUILLIAM* 

Mr. PERRY. Thank you, Dr. Jasser. 

The Chair now recognizes Ms. Aziz for an opening statement. 

STATEMENT OF SAHAR F. AZIZ, PROFESSOR OF LAW, TEXAS 

A&M UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LAW 

Ms. AZIZ. Mr. Chairman and distinguished Members of the committee, thank you for inviting me to testify. For over 15 years I 

have worked with Muslim communities in America in various capacities, including as a civil rights lawyer and as a senior policy 

advisor for the Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties at the U.S. 

Department of Homeland Security. 

Currently, I am a professor at Texas A&M University School of 

Law where I teach and research at the intersection of National security and civil liberties. The opinions I express today are my own. 

I ask that my testimony be admitted into the record. 

Mr. PERRY. Without objection, so ordered. 

Ms. AZIZ. I want to address four key issues. First, countering violent extremism programs are counterproductive as they feed the 

Daesh’s narrative that America is at war with Islam. Second, CVE 

programs are unnecessary. Third, they are a waste of Government 

63 

resources. Fourth, funds for community development and resilience 

programs should be administered by social service agencies without 

law enforcement control. 

National security is a priority that crosses partisan lines. Americans of all races, ethnicities, and religions are equally concerned 

with ensuring our country is safe from violence, whether politicallymotivated terrorism, State violence, or violent crime. 

Furthermore, we all share an interest in preventing violence before it occurs. As citizens and elected officials, we have a responsibility to carefully examine whether the methods we are using to 

prevent terrorism are effective. 

Using ‘‘Islamic’’ to label terrorism and terrorists is counterproductive because we give Daesh exactly what it wants—legitimacy. Daesh wants to be called Islamic because 99.9 percent of the 

1.5 billion Muslims across the world reject them and refuse to bestow them with the authority to represent them. Hence, when we 

call them Islamic terrorists, they win the war of ideas. 

Second, using a religious identity to label a criminal is a slippery 

slope to calling criminals Christian terrorists, Jewish terrorists, or 

other religious labels based on a suspect’s characteristics or ideology. This has serious adverse consequences on religious freedom 

and imposes guilt by association on faith communities in the 

United States. It is just a matter of time before a Muslim terrorist 

eventually is used as a basis to call someone a Christian terrorist. 

Now the Obama administration’s CVE programs are managed 

and funded by DHS and DOJ. As a result, they securitize Government-community relations such that Muslims are perceived and engaged with primarily through a security lens. Muslim Americans 

are treated as potential terrorists first and citizens second. 

Such securitized treatment of an entire religious community is 

counterproductive. CVE signals to the public that Muslims warrant 

collective suspicion. According to a December 2015 Gallup poll, 43 

percent of Americans harbor prejudice toward Muslims. These biases have been contributing toward an alarming spike in anti-Muslim discrimination and hate crimes. Among the most troubling 

trends is the bullying of Muslim students. 

In 2016 a survey in California of more than 600 Muslim American students in middle and high school found that 55 percent reported being bullied or discriminated against, twice the number of 

students nationally who reported being bullied. Additionally, a report by California State University found that anti-Muslim hate 

crimes increased 78 percent in 2015, at 196 compared to 110 hate 

crimes in 2014. 

International terrorists point to discrimination and selective government targeting of Muslims in their recruiting efforts to gain followers and sympathy for their perverse political agenda. Daesh, in 

particular, relies on marginalization and alienation to fuel its narrative that America is at war with Islam. 

Moreover, CVE programs are unnecessary to preserve American 

National security. Muslims, like all other Americans, do not need 

a special program for them to be Good Samaritans that report suspicious criminal activity about which they have knowledge. 

A 2016 Duke University report found that Muslim communities 

across the country have a positive relationship with police and that 

64 

1 The viewpoints expressed here are solely those of the author and do not represent the viewpoints or positions of Texas A&M University School of Law, the Brookings Doha Center, or the 

Institute for Social Policy and Understanding. 2 See Texas A&M School of Law, Faculty Profiles, Sahar F. Aziz, http://law.tamu.edu/ 

faculty-staff/find-people/faculty-profiles/sahar-aziz. See also Sahar F. Aziz’s Scholarly Papers, 

SOCIAL SCIENCES RESEARCH NETWORK, http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cfldev/ 

AbsByAuth.cfm?perlid=1459001. 3 See, e.g., Sahar F. Aziz, Policing Terrorists in the Community, 5 Harv. Nat’l Sec. L.J. 147 

(2014); Sahar Aziz, Caught in a Preventive Dragnet: Selective Counterterrorism in a Post-9/11 

America, 47 Gonz. L. Rev. 429 (2011/2012); Sahar Aziz, Federal Civil Rights Engagement with 

Arab and Muslim American Communities Post 9/11, 18 J. Gender Race & Just. 1 (2015); Sahar 

Aziz, Security and Technology: Rethinking National Security, 2 Tex. A&M L. Rev. 7791 (2015); 

Sahar F. Aziz, From the Oppressed to the Terrorist: Muslim American Women Caught in the 

Crosshairs of Intersectionality, 9 HASTINGS R. & POV. L. J. 1 (2012). 4 See, e.g., Sahar Aziz, Independence Without Accountability: The Judicial Paradox of Egypt’s 

Failed Transition to Democracy, 120 Penn St. L. Rev. 101 (2016); Sahar Aziz, Bringing Down 

an Uprising: Egypt’s Stillborn Revolution, 30 Conn. J. Int’l L. 1 (2014); Sahar Aziz, Revolution 

they are willing to engage with police departments based on principles of fairness and equal treatment. 

According to the New America Foundation, approximately 60 

percent of terrorism plots have been prevented due to traditional 

investigative methods of which 18 percent of those cases were 

solved by initial tips from Muslim communities without the need 

for costly and counterproductive CVE programs. 

CVE is also a waste of resources because Muslim Americans 

know less about potential plots by individuals acting alone, in secret and on-line than law enforcement agencies with a sophisticated array of law enforcement tools and investigative tools. For example, the Boston Marathon bombing, Orlando and San 

Bernardino mass shootings, and attempted Times Square bombing 

were all perpetrated by individuals whose families and friends 

were as shocked to discover their illicit acts as any other American. 

In conclusion, the tens of millions of dollars spent on CVE programs are better spent on programs administered by social service 

agencies with the expertise to assist the multitude of American 

communities in need of job training, mental health services, refugee resettlement, youth programs, and other services that promote safe and healthy communities. 

Muslim Americans have made significant contributions to our society and our economy as doctors, teachers, engineers, politicians, 

and entrepreneurs. They deserve to be treated with the same dignity, equality, and presumption of innocence as all other Americans. Thank you, and I welcome your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Aziz follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF SAHAR F. AZIZ1

SEPTEMBER 22, 2016 

Mr. Chairman and distinguished Members of the committee: Thank you for inviting me to testify before the Subcommittee on Oversight and Management Efficiency 

in the U.S. Homeland Security Committee. For over 15 years, I have worked with 

Muslim, Arab, and South Asian communities in the United States in various capacities including as a community advocate, civil rights lawyer, and Senior Policy Advisor for the Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties at the U.S. Department of 

Homeland Security. 

Currently, I am a professor of law at Texas A&M University School of Law,2 a 

non-resident fellow with the Brookings Doha Center, and scholar at the Institute 

for Social Policy and Understanding. My research focuses on law and policy the 

intersection of National security and civil liberties with a focus on Muslim, Arab, 

and South Asian communities in the United States.3 In addition, I research the relationship between, rule of law, authoritarianism, and terrorism in the Middle East4. 

65 

Without Reform? A Critique of Egypt’s Election Laws, 45 George Washington Int’l L. Rev. (2012); 

Sahar Aziz, Egypt’s Protracted Revolution, 19 No. 3 Hum. Rts. Brief 1 (2012); Sahar Aziz, Linking Intellectual Property Rights with Research and Development, Technology Transfer, and Foreign Investment: A Case Study of Egypt’s Pharmaceutical Industry, 10 ILSA J. of Int’l & Comp. 

L. 1 (2003). 5 Although there is no single definition of terrorism in U.S. or international law, I define terrorism here as an attack on civilians for larger political objectives, whether couched in religious 

or secular narratives. 6 Press Release, Office of the Press Secretary, The White House, FACT SHEET: The White 

House Summit on Countering Violent Extremism (Feb. 18, 2015), https://www.whitehouse.gov/ 

the-press-office/2015/02/18/fact-sheet-white-house-summit-countering-violent-extremism. 7 E.g.,Tiffany Ap, Al-Shabaab recruit video with Trump excerpt: U.S. is racist, anti-Muslim, 

CNN (Jan. 3, 2016, 9:20 AM), http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/02/middleeast/al-shabaab-videotrump/. 8 David Schanzer, et al., Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security, Sanford 

School of Public Policy, Duke University, The Challenge and Promise of Using Community Policing Strategies to Prevent Violent Extremism (2016), https://sites.duke.edu/tcths/files/2016/05/ 

Continued 

My testimony today is a based on my extensive experience working with Muslim, 

Arab, and South Asian communities as well as my academic research examining the 

myriad ways our National security laws and policies adversely impact these diverse 

communities’ civil rights and liberties. The opinions I am expressing in both my 

written and verbal testimony are my own. 

I want to address four key issues: (1) Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) programs securitize Muslim communities and validate terrorists’ narratives that America is at war with Islam; (2) CVE programs are unnecessary to prevent domestic 

terrorism; (3) CVE programs are a waste of Government resources; and (4) Government funds for community development and resilience should be funded and administered by social service agencies without law enforcement control. 

American National security is a priority that crosses partisan lines. Americans of 

all races, ethnicities and religions are equally concerned with ensuring our country 

is safe from violence—whether politically-motivated terrorism, State violence, or violent crime.5 Furthermore, we all share an interest in preventing violence before it 

occurs. Toward that end, as citizens and elected officials we have a responsibility 

to carefully examine whether the methods we are using to prevent terrorism are effective. 

The Obama administration has initiated a ‘‘Countering Violent Extremism’’ program purportedly aimed at tackling the underlying causes that may contribute to 

terrorism domestically and abroad. According to the White House, ‘‘CVE efforts address the root causes of extremism through community engagement’’ and ‘‘the underlying premise of the approach to countering violent extremism in the United 

States is that: (1) Communities provide the solution to violent extremism; and (2) 

CVE efforts are best pursued at the local level, tailored to local dynamics, where 

local officials continue to build relationships within their communities through established community policing and community outreach mechanisms.’’6

Despite the lofty rhetoric, these CVE programs are fundamentally flawed for three 

reasons: They are counterproductive, unnecessary, and a waste of Government resources. Government programs seeking to build community resilience are most effective when administered by social service agencies with the requisite expertise, not 

law enforcement agencies. 

First, CVE programs managed and funded by the U.S. Department of Homeland 

Security and the U.S. Department of Justice securitize Government-community relations such that Muslims are perceived and engaged with primarily through a security lens. Muslim Americans are potential terrorists first, and citizens second. Such 

securitized treatment of an entire religious community is counterproductive. Not 

only does it risk innocent Americans’ civil liberties and signal to the public that 

Muslims warrant collective suspicion, but CVE focused on Muslims confirms international terrorists’ narratives that America is at war with Islam. In turn, terrorists 

point to such religious profiling and selective targeting of Muslims in their international recruiting efforts to gain followers and sympathy for their perverse political 

agenda.7

Second, CVE programs are unnecessary to preserve American National security. 

Muslims—like other Americans—do not need a special program for them to be good 

Samaritans that report suspicious criminal activity of which they have knowledge. 

Indeed, a Duke University report found that Muslim communities across the country have a positive relationship with their local police or express a willingness to 

engage with police departments based on principles of fairness and equal treatment.8 And according to the New America Foundation, approximately 60% of terVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00069 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
66 

The-Challenge-and-Promise-of-Using-Community-Policing-Strategies-to-Prevent-Violent-Extremism.pdf. 9 Peter Bergen, David Sterman, Emily Schneider, & Bailey Cahall, New America Foundation, 

Do NSA’s Bulk Surveillance Programs Stop Terrorists? 4–5 (2014), https://na-production.s3.amazonaws.com/documents/do-nsas-bulk-surveillance-programs-stop-terrorists; Michael 

Hirsh, Inside the FBI’s Secret Muslim Network: While candidates stoke fears of Islam, a littleknown counterterror program has been going exactly the other way, Politico (Mar. 24, 2016), 

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/03/fbi-muslim-outreach-terrorism-213765. 10 See Jana Kasperkevic, Welfare programs shown to reduce poverty in America, Guardian 

(Nov. 12, 2014 1:39 PM), https://www.theguardian.com/money/us-money-blog/2014/nov/12/ 

social-welfare-programs-food-stamps-reduce-poverty-america. 11 Madiha Afzal, How we all reinforce a narrative of Islam versus the West, Brookings (Aug. 

4, 2016), https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2016/08/04/how-we-all-reinforcea-narrative-of-islam-versus-the-west/. 12 Matt Olson, Why ISIS Supports Donald Trump, Time (Sept. 8, 2016 9:31 AM), http:// 

time.com/4480945/isis-donald-trump/; Tierney Sneed & Lauren Fox, Why Some Jihadists Consider Donald Trump To Be The Perfect Enemy, Talking Points Memo (June 30, 2016, 6:00 AM), 

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/trump-extremist-web-forums. 13 Alex P. Schmid, Challenging the Narrative of the ‘‘Islamic State’’, in Countering Violent Extremism: Developing an Evidence-base for Policy and Practice 67 (Sara Zeiger & Anne Aly eds. 

2015), https://www.nla.gov.au/sites/default/files/webform/draftlcveldevelopinglanlevidence-basedlforlpolicylandlpractice.pdf. 14 Patrick Goodenough, ISIS Urges Supporters to Kill Muslim ‘Infidels’ in West, Including 

Congressman and Top Clinton Aide, cnsnews.com (Apr. 13, 2016), http://www.cnsnews.com/ 

news/article/patrick-goodenough/isis-urges-supporters-kill-named-muslim-infidels-west-rep-ellison; See also Ian Reifowitz, Anti-ISIS Muslims face death threats. Is that ‘enough’ for Hannity 

and Trump lackey Ben Carson?, Daily Kos (May 15, 2016), http://www.dailykos.com/story/ 

2016/5/15/1525349/-Anti-ISIS-Muslims-face-death-threats-Is-that-enough-for-Hannity-andTrump-lackey-Ben-Carson. 15 Willa Frej, How 70,000 Muslim Clerics Are Standing Up To Terrorism, HUFFINGTON 

POST (Dec. 11, 2015), http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/muslim-clerics-condemn-terrorismlusl566adfa1e4b009377b249dea[] 

rorism plots have been prevented due to traditional investigative methods, including 

about 18% by initial tips from Muslim communities without the need for costly and 

counterproductive CVE programs.9

Third, the tens of millions of dollars spent on CVE programs are better spent on 

programs administered through social services agencies with the expertise to assist 

the multitude of American communities in need of job training, mental health services, domestic violence prevention, English language training, refugee resettlement, 

youth after-school programs, tutoring, and other services that promote safe and 

healthy communities.10 To the extent the U.S. Government seeks to engage in goodfaith efforts to support the diverse Muslim American communities, resources should 

be managed by institutions whose missions are to develop communities, not prosecute and incarcerate individuals based on racial and ethnic stereotypes. 

I. CVE PROGRAMS SECURITIZE MUSLIM COMMUNITIES AND VALIDATE TERRORISTS’ 

WARPED NARRATIVES THAT AMERICA IS AT WAR WITH ISLAM

Terrorists thrive on narratives of oppression and injustice as a means of recruiting vulnerable individuals. The particular narrative selected is context-specific to 

the political, social, and economic circumstances that give rise to a terrorist group. 

For al-Qaeda and Da’esh (also known as ISIS or ISIL) based in the Middle East, 

a crucial component of their recruitment narrative is that the West, and America 

in particular, is at war with Islam.11 Terrorists claim that Muslims are victims of 

Western hegemony in the Middle East through American military intervention and 

financial support of dictators that violently repress their Muslim citizens.12 Da’esh 

portrays its violence as part of a defensive rather than offensive war where its leaders are the heroic defenders of the Muslim world against Western colonization.13 In 

turn, Da’esh makes a call to arms for Muslims to kill civilians and governments that 

it unilaterally declares as enemies. Among Da’esh’s declared enemies are mainstream American Muslim leaders who have openly and repeatedly condemned 

Da’esh and rebuked its misinterpretation of Islamic principles.14

Notwithstanding Da’esh and other terrorist groups’ attempts to use religion as a 

justification for their politically-motivated violence, their claims are rejected by 

nearly all of the 1.5 billion Muslims across the world.15 Another often overlooked 

fact that contributes to Da’esh’s fringe status among the world’s Muslims is that the 

vast majority of victims of terrorism are Muslim. According to the National Counterterrorism Center’s 2011 Report on Terrorism, in cases where the religious affiliation 

of terrorism casualties could be determined, Muslims suffered between 82% and 97% 

67 

16 The Nat’l Counterterrorism Ctr., Report on Terrorism 14 (2011), https://fas.org/irp/ 

threat/nctc2011.pdf. 17 Open Letter to Al-Baghdadi (2014), http://www.lettertobaghdadi.com/. 18 E.g., Stoyan Zaimov, Muslim-Americans Condemn ISIS in Phoenix Billboard, Say Islam Is 

Religion of Peace, Not Terror, Christian Post (Aug. 24, 2016, 11:17 AM), http:// 

www.christianpost.com/news/muslim-americans-condemn-isis-phoenix-billboard-islam-religionpeace-not-terror-168487/ (Muslim-Americans post billboard reading ‘‘HEY ISIS, YOU SUCK!!!’’); 

Omar Jimenez, Baltimore Muslims: Islam condemns ISIS, terror attacks, WBAL–TV (Mar. 23, 

2016, 6:16 PM), http://www.wbaltv.com/news/baltimore-muslims-islam-condemns-isis-terror-attacks/38661300; Alexandra Limon, Muslims rally outside White House condemning ISIS, terrorism, (Nov. 20, 2015 11:30 PM), http://www.fox5dc.com/news/local-news/52446799-story; 

Tatiana Sanchez, San Diego Muslims condemn Paris attacks, San Diego Union Tribune (Nov. 

14, 2015, 8:38 PM), http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/sdut-cair-anniversary-banquetislamic-2015nov14-story.html; Shanika Gunaratna, Muslim Americans rush to condemn Orlando massacre, CBS News (June 13, 2016 12:52 PM), http://www.cbsnews.com/news/orlando-shooting-pulse-nightclub-muslims-condemn-attack/. 19 See Schmid, supra note 13; Terrence McCoy, The apocalyptic magazine the Islamic State 

uses to recruit and radicalize foreigners, Wash. Post (Sept. 16, 2014), https:// 

www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/09/16/the-apocalyptic-magazine-the-islamic-state-uses-to-recruit-and-radicalize-foreigners/. 20 See Abbas Barzegar, Shawn Powers, & Nagham El Karhili, Civic Approaches to Confronting Violent Extremism: Sector Recommendations and Best Practices (Sept. 2016), http:// 

www.britishcouncil.us/sites/default/files/civiclapproachesltolconfrontinglviolentlex- tremismldigitallrelease.pdf. 21 Community Outreach, FBI, https://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices/losangeles/ 

community-outreach-1 (last visited Sept. 20, 2016); Michael Hirsh, Inside the FBI’s Secret Muslim Network: While candidates stoke fears of Islam, a little-known counterterror program has 

been going exactly the other way, Politico (Mar. 24, 2016), http://www.politico.com/magazine/ 

story/2016/03/fbi-muslim-outreach-terrorism-213765. 22 Laura Yuen, Muslims fear anti-terror program could spy on their communities, MPR News 

(Jan. 30, 2015), http://www.mprnews.org/story/2015/01/30/anti-terror-program; Mike German, Is the FBI’s Community Outreach Program a Trojan Horse?, ACLU (Feb. 15, 2013, 3:33 

PM), https://www.aclu.org/blog/fbis-community-outreach-program-trojan-horse; Paul McEnroe, 

Twin Cities Muslim leaders challenge federal outreach effort as cloak for spying, Star Tribune 

(Feb. 17, 2015, 11:32 PM), http://www.startribune.com/area-muslim-leaders-call-federal-outreach-cloak-for-spying/292307031/. 

of terrorism-related fatalities during the prior 5 years and Muslim countries bore 

the brunt of the attacks involving 10 or more deaths.16

Debunking Da’esh’s specious claims on the merits is beyond the scope of my testimony, and already has been done by hundreds of credible, mainstream Muslim 

scholars from across the world in the Open Letter to Baghdadi.17 Moreover, Muslim 

communities and leaders across the United States have rejected Da’esh’s warped 

misappropriation of Islamic doctrine for violent political ends.18 Thus, the issue before us today is not whether Da’esh represents the 1.5 billion Muslims across the 

world or the 3 to 6 million Muslims in America—the evidence is clear that it does 

not. 

Rather, the issue that should be of concern to Members of this committee is ensuring that the American government does not adopt counterproductive policies or 

practices that validate terrorists’ claims of a ‘‘clash of civilization’’ between the West 

and Islam.19 Religious profiling, racialized counterterrorism enforcement, and discrimination against Muslims not only infringes on civil rights and liberties of Muslims, but is also exploited by terrorist groups to claim that Muslims are under attack and generate sympathy for their cause.20

This is where current CVE programs are highly problematic. The Government 

portrays CVE as a means to build community resilience and development, separate 

from the dominant prosecution-driven counterterrorism model. However, the record 

clearly shows that CVE is an integral part of counterterrorism. Law enforcement 

agencies, not social services agencies, are leading and funding CVE Nation-wide. 

DHS, U.S. Attorneys, and the FBI lead Government meetings with Muslim communities across the country.21 The institutional agendas of FBI agents, Federal prosecutors, and DHS officials—not social service agencies—shape CVE programs. For 

these reasons, the leading agencies of the Federal interagency task force on CVE 

rotate between DHS and DOJ—whose missions are to investigate, prosecute, and 

convict criminal suspects. 

That U.S. Attorneys are leading Federal outreach at the local level raises further 

questions as to the relationship between counterterrorism enforcement and community engagement given that U.S. Attorneys are also the lead prosecutors of anti-terrorism laws.22 Their participation as lead conveners of CVE meetings aggravates 

the inherent divergence between Muslim communities’ interests in protecting their 

civil liberties and prosecutors’ mandate to prosecute and show tangible results in 

the form of convictions. That is, law enforcement-led programs signal to Muslim 

68 

23 Sahar F. Aziz, Policing Terrorists in the Community, 5 Harv. Nat’l Sec. L.J. 147 (2014). 24 See Arun Kundnani, THE MUSLIMS ARE COMING: ISLAMOPHOBIA, EXTREMISM, 

AND THE DOMESTIC WAR ON TERROR (2015). 25 BRENNAN CENTER FOR JUSTICE, Countering Violent Extremism: Myths and Fact, 

https://www.brennancenter.org/sites/default/files/analysis/102915%20Final%20CVE%20- 

Fact%20Sheet.pdf. 26 Murtaza Hussein and Jenna McLaughlin, FBI’s ‘‘Shared Responsibility Committees’’ to 

Identify ‘‘Radicalized’’ Muslims Raise Alarms, THE INTERCEPT (April 9, 2016). 27 E.g., Islamophobia: Understanding Anti-Muslim Sentiment in the West, Gallup, http:// 

www.gallup.com/poll/157082/islamophobia-understanding-anti-muslim-sentiment-west.aspx 

(last visited Sept. 2, 2016) (‘‘In the U.S., about one-half of nationally representative samples of 

Mormons, Protestants, Catholics, Muslims, and Jews agree that in general, most Americans are 

prejudiced toward Muslim Americans. Specifically, 66% of Jewish Americans and 60% of Muslim 

Americans say that Americans in general are prejudiced toward Muslim Americans.’’); Jonathan 

Easily, SC exit poll: 75 percent agree with Trump’s Muslim ban, Hill (February 20, 2016, 6:17 

PM), http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/270156-sc-exit-poll-75-percent-agreewith-trumps-muslim-ban. Rebecca Shabad, CBS News projects Donald Trump win in South 

Carolina primary, CBS (Feb. 20, 2016, 5:20 PM), http://www.cbsnews.com/news/results-fromsouth-carolinas-gop-primary-to-soon-trickle-in/ (‘‘Three-fourths of Republicans participating in 

Saturday’s South Carolina GOP primary say they support presidential hopeful Donald Trump’s 

proposal to ban all Muslims from entering the U.S., according to an exit poll.’’); Tom Benning, 

Most Texas voters support Donald Trump’s border wall and Muslim ban, poll says, Dall. Morning News (June 28, 2016, 11:53 AM), http://www.dallasnews.com/news/politics/headlines/ 

20160628-most-texas-voters-support-donald-trumps-border-wall-and-muslim-ban-poll-says.ece 

(last updated June 28, 2016, 4:18 PM) (‘‘Nearly 52 percent of respondents said they strongly 

or somewhat support a wall along the Mexican border, compared with about 40 percent who 

oppose it. The numbers were similar in response to the idea of banning noncitizen Muslims from 

entering the U.S.’’); Jesse Hellmann, Poll: Americans split on Trump’s proposed Muslim ban, 

Hill (June 16, 2016, 5:00 PM), http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/283789- 

poll-americans-split-on-trumps-muslim-ban-proposal (‘‘The NBC News/SurveyMonkey poll shows 

50 percent of those surveyed support Trump’s proposed Muslim immigration ban, while 46 percent are opposed.’’); Kristina Wong, Poll: Half of American voters back Trump’s Muslim ban, Hill 

(Mar. 29, 2016, 5:30 AM), http://thehill.com/policy/defense/274521-poll-half-of-american-votersback-trumps-muslim-ban (‘‘A ‘virtual majority’ of American voters—49 percent—also agrees with 

Cruz’s call for additional law enforcement patrols of Muslim neighborhoods in the U.S., the poll 

showed.’’);[sic.] 28 September 24–27, 2015 Survey of 576 Republican primary voters, Pub. Policy Polling (Sept. 

29, 2015), http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/2015/PPPlReleaselNCl92915.pdf. 

communities that their community development and resilience is not the Government’s priority. Rather the objective appears to be to deputize Muslim leaders to 

spy on each other, thereby breeding distrust and divisiveness within Muslim communities.23

While prosecution-driven counterterrorism is an integral part of criminal enforcement, it should be conducted in accordance with civil and Constitutional rights. Specifically, law enforcement should conduct investigations based on individualized suspicion arising from predicate acts of criminal activity, not a broad (and false) assumption that Muslim communities en masse are ‘‘at risk’’ or ‘‘vulnerable’’ to terrorist recruitment and susceptible to engaging in terrorism. 

II. CVE SIGNALS TO THE PUBLIC THAT MUSLIMS ARE A SUSPECT COMMUNITY LEADING

TO MORE DISCRIMINATION AND HATE CRIMES

Like the United Kingdom’s (UK) Prevent Program, which is the blueprint on 

which the U.S. CVE program is based, CVE programs target Muslim communities 

based on the false premise that Muslims are a suspect community and fifth column 

in the United States.24 The U.K. House of Commons found that Prevent’s exclusive 

focus on Muslims was stigmatizing, alienating, and counterproductive. The European Parliament also found that soft counter-terrorism programs through counterradicalization initiatives (which is effectively what CVE is) are detrimental to fostering community cohesion and do not succeed in their stated objectives to prevent 

terrorism.25 Professor Arun Kundnani, an expert on U.K. counterterrorism policy, 

warns that the U.S. program would ‘‘suffer from the same problems, such as drawing non-policing professionals into becoming the eyes and ears of counterterrorism 

surveillance, and thereby undermining professional norms and relationships of trust 

among educators, health workers, and others.’’26 CVE also legitimizes discrimination 

against Muslims. 

In the United States, numerous polls show a rise in anti-Muslim bias that is 

manifesting into tangible hate crimes, mosque vandalizations, employment discrimination, and bullying of Muslim kids in schools.27 A 2015 poll in North Carolina, for 

example, reported 72% of respondents said that a Muslim should not be allowed to 

be president of the United States and 40% said that Islam should be illegal.28 A 

2015 study by LifeWay Research found that 27% of Americans believe ISIS repVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00072 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
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29 One in Three Americans Worry About Sharia Law Being Applied in America, LifeWay (Feb. 

11, 2015), http://lifewayresearch.com/2015/02/11/1-in-3-americans-worry-about-sharia-lawbeing-applied-in-america/. 30 Kathy Frankovic, Muslim Americans widely seen as victims of discrimination, YouGov (Feb. 

20, 2015), https://today.yougov.com/news/2015/02/20/muslim-americans-widely-seen-victimsdiscriminatio/. That same poll also found that three-fourths of Americans—73%—think American Muslims face a great deal or a fair amount of discrimination. Id. 31 Eric Lichtblau, Hate Crimes Against American Muslims Most Since Post-9/11 Era, N.Y. 

Times (Sept. 17, 2016), http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/18/us/politics/hate-crimes-american-muslims-rise.html. 32 Ctr. for the Study of Hate & Extremism, Cal. State Univ., Special Status Report: Hate 

Crime in the United States 6 (2016), https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3110202-SPECIAL-STATUS-REPORT-v5-9-16-16.html. 33 Recent Incidents of Anti-Muslim Hate Crimes, MUSLIM ADVOCATES (2016), https:// 

www.muslimadvocates.org/map-anti-muslim-hate-crimes/. 34 Nearly Two-Thirds of Hate Crimes Went Unreported to Police in Recent Years, U.S. DEP’T 

OF JUSTICE (Mar. 21, 2013), http://ojp.gov/newsroom/pressreleases/2013/ojppr032113.pdf. 35 Lauren del Valle, 2 Muslim women, babies attacked in alleged hate crime in New York, 

CNN (Sept. 10, 2016, 12:49 AM), http://www.cnn.com/2016/09/10/us/brooklyn-muslimwomen-attacked/. 36 Lindsey Bever, Arrest made in arson at Orlando gunman’s mosque, authorities say, Wash. 

Post (Sept. 14, 2016), https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2016/09/12/ 

arson-suspected-in-fire-at-florida-mosque-attended-by-pulse-shooter-omar-mateen/. 37 Laurel Raymond, Assault of Muslim Man in NYC Comes Amid Rising Islamophobia Nationwide, THINKPROGRESS (June 6, 2016), http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2016/06/06/ 

3785049/muslim-man-attackedqueens/. 38 Rocco Parascandola, Bronx Livery Driver Repeatedly Punched In the Face By Passenger Who 

Called Him ‘Muslim Driver A--hole,’ N.Y. DAILY NEWS (May 25, 2016), http:// 

www.nydailynews.com/newyork/bronx-livery-driver-punched-called-muslim-driver-a-hole-article1.2648669. 39 Ajay Ghosh, Hate Crime Charged Against Pittman for Spokane Gurdwara Vandalism, UNIVERSAL NEWS NETWORK, (Mar. 15, 2016), http://theunn.com/2016/03/hate-crime-chargedagainst-pittman-for-spokane-gurdwara-vandalism/. 40 Steve Birr, Police Release Video of Assault on Muslim Woman Outside DC Starbucks, THE 

DAILY CALLER (May 3, 2016), http://dailycaller.com/2016/05/03/police-release-video-of-assault-on-muslimwoman-outside-dc-starbucks/. 

resents what the Islamic religion really is—along with 45% of 1,000 ‘‘senior Protestant pastors.’’29 Another survey by the Economist/YouGov poll, found that 52% of 

Americans think Islam is more likely than other religions to encourage violence.30

Such pervasive prejudice has produced tangible civil rights violations against innocent Muslims across the country.31 A recent report by the Center for the Study 

of Hate and Extremism at California State University in San Bernadino found that 

anti-Muslim hate crimes increased 78% in 2015 at 196 as compared to 110 hate 

crimes in 2014.32 Anti-Arab hate crimes rose by 219% from 21 in 2014 to 67 in 2015. 

Similarly, the civil rights organizations Muslim Advocates, reported that since the 

November 2015 Paris attacks, at least 100 hate crimes against Muslims in American have been reported.33

However, these stark numbers likely do not reflect the entirety of anti-Muslim 

discrimination. The U.S. Department of Justice Bureau of Statistics reported that 

only 44% of hate crimes are reported to the police, and in 2013, the Bureau found 

that nearly two-thirds of all hate crimes are unreported.34

Examples of hate crimes against Muslims and those perceived to be Muslim that 

occurred in 2015–2016 include: 

• Sept. 10, 2016: Two Muslim women pushing their children in strollers were attacked in Brooklyn by an assailant who spewed anti-Muslim slurs.35

• Sept. 12, 2016: A man set fire to the Islamic Center of Fort Pierce, Florida.36

• June 1, 2016: A Muslim man was assaulted and beaten after leaving a mosque. 

He suffered at least 5 broken bones, a concussion, and fractured ribs.37

• May 21, 2016: A delivery driver was brutally beaten by a passenger who called 

him a ‘‘Muslim a-hole.’’ He was punched multiple times before trying to escape 

the vehicle, and then later pulled to the ground and was punched and stomped 

on.38

• Mar. 3, 2016: A Sikh temple was vandalized by a man who said he thought it 

was a mosque and affiliated with terrorists.39

• April 21, 2016: A Muslim woman wearing a headscarf had hot liquid poured on 

her by another woman shouting ‘‘Muslim piece of trash.’’41

70 

41 Kevin Killeen, Affton Man Charged With Anti-Muslim Hate Crime, CBS ST. LOUIS (Feb. 

29, 2016), http://stlouis.cbslocal.com/2016/02/29/muslims-wait-for-bob-mcculloch-to-filecharges/. 42 Charles Lam, Sikh Man Stabbed to Death in Robbery of Central California Convenience 

Store, NBC NEWS (Jan. 5, 2016, http://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/sikh-manstabbed-death-robbery-central-california-convenience-store-n490786. 43 Travis Gettys, Muslim Woman Shot At and Another Nearly Run Off the Road in Tampa 

After Leaving Mosques, RAW STORY (Dec. 11, 2015), https://www.rawstory.com/2015/12/ 

muslim-woman-shot-at-and-another-nearly-run-off-the-road-in-tampa-after-leaving-mosques/. 44 Dan Majors, Muslim Taxi Driver Shot on Thanksgiving in Hazelwood Calls Attack a Hate 

Crime, PITT. POST GAZETTE (Nov. 29, 2015), http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2015/ 

11/29/Muslim-taxi-drivershot-on-Thanksgiving-in-Pittsburgh-calls-attack-a-hate-crime/stories/ 

201511290154. 45 Donna St. George, During a school year of terrorist attacks, Muslim students report bullying, Wash. Post (June 14, 2016), https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/during-aschool-year-of-terrorist-attacks-muslim-students-report-bullying/2016/06/14/1b066a44-3220- 

11e6-8758-d58e76e11b12lstory.html. 46 Tatiana Sanchez, Muslim students report bullying at twice the rate of non-Muslim peers, 

survey shows, L.A. Times (Oct. 31, 2015, 4:00 AM), http://www.latimes.com/local/california/ 

la-me-1031-bullying-20151031-story.html. 47 Engy Abdelkader, Bridge Initiative, Special Report, When Islamophobia Turns Violent: The 

206 U.S. Presidential Elections 1–2 (2016), http://bridge.georgetown.edu/wp-content/uploads/ 

2016/05/When-Islamophobia-Turns-Violent.pdf. 48 David Schanzer, Charles Kursman, Jessica Toliver & Elizabeth Miller, The Challenge and 

Promise of Using Community Policing Strategies to Prevent Violent Extremism: A Call for Community Partnerships with Law Enforcement to Enhance Public Safety, Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security, Sanford School of Public Policy, Duke University (2016), 

https://sanford.duke.edu/sites/sanford.duke.edu/files/documents/2015-full-report-FINAL1.pdf. 49 Mike German, Is the FBI’s Community Outreach Program a Trojan Horse?, ACLU (Feb. 

15, 2013, 3:33 PM), https://www.aclu.org/blog/fbis-community-outreach-program-trojan-horse; 

Michael Price, Brennan Ctr. for Justice, Community Outreach or Intelligence Gathering? A Clos-

• Feb. 21, 2016: While a Muslim family was shopping for a home, a man in the 

neighborhood pointed a gun at them saying they ‘‘should all die’’ because they 

are Muslim.41

• Jan. 1, 2016: An elderly Sikh man was stabbed to death while working at a convenience store.42

• Dec. 11, 2015: In two separate incidents, one American Muslim female was shot 

as she was leaving an Islamic center. Another woman was nearly run off the 

road by someone throwing rocks at her car as she left the mosque.43

• Nov. 26, 2015: A taxi driver—a 38-year-old Moroccan immigrant—was shot and 

injured by one of his passengers after being asked about his background.44

Among the most troubling forms of anti-Muslim discrimination is the bullying 

taking place in our schools. In 2010, a study in Northern Virginia found that 80% 

of Muslim youth were subjected to taunts and harassment at school. In 2014, a survey of Muslim children in third through twelfth grade in Maryland found that nearly one-third ‘‘said they had experienced insults or abuse at least once because of 

their faith.’’45 That same year, a State-wide survey of more than 600 Muslim American students ages 11–18 in California found that 55% of respondents reported being 

been bullied or discriminated against, twice the number of students Nationally who 

reported being bullied. Additionally, 29% of Muslim female students who wear a 

headscarf experienced offensive touching or pulling off their hijab.46

These findings are consistent with a 2016 report published by Georgetown University finding 180 reported incidents of anti-Muslim violence between March 2015 and 

March 2016. Among the incidents reported are 12 murders, 34 physical assaults, 56 

acts of vandalism or destruction of property, 9 arsons, and 8 shootings and bombings.47

Despite the troubling rise in anti-Muslim discrimination and hate crimes, Muslims believe their public safety concerns are not adequately addressed at law-enforcement-led community outreach meetings. Instead, law enforcement agents are 

primarily interested in knowing if Muslims have any knowledge of potential terrorist plots.48 A comprehensive empirical study published in 2016 by Duke’s Center 

for Terrorism also found that interviewees believed law enforcement agencies have 

broken communities’ trust in the past by violating civil liberties of Muslims who 

worked with them. 

These broken promises have produced a deep distrust that in turn has stifled coordination between civil society and law enforcement. For example, an American 

Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request uncovered 

documents showing that the FBI was keeping records of conversations and activities 

within mosques and other Muslim organizations from 2004 through 2008 and information provided by Federal employees engaged in the outreach programs.49 This 

71 

er Look at ‘‘Countering Violent Extremism’’ Programs, https://www.brennancenter.org/sites/ 

default/files/analysis/CommunitylOutreachlorlIntelligencelGathering.pdf (last visited 

Sept. 20, 2016). 50 E.g., H.G. Reza, FBI Tries to Reassure Muslims in Irvine, (June 7, 2006), http://articles.latimes.com/2006/jun/07/local/me-muslim7. 51 Cora Currier & Murtaza Hussain, Letter Details FBI Plan for Secretive Anti-Radicalization 

Committees, Intercept (Apr. 28, 2016, 12:02 PM), https://theintercept.com/2016/04/28/letterdetails-fbi-plan-for-secretive-anti-radicalization-committees/. 52 See Eye on the FBI, AM. CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION, https://www.aclu.org/national-security/eye-fbi-exposing-misconduct-and-abuse-authority (last visited Sept. 20, 2016); ACLU Eye on 

the FBI: The FBI is Engaged in Unconstitutional Racial Profiling and Racial ‘‘Mapping’’, Am. 

Civil Liberties Union, https://www.aclu.org/aclu-eye-fbi-fbi-engaged-unconstitutional-racialprofiling-and-racial-mapping (last visited Sept. 20, 2016); ACLU Eye on the FBI Alert—Mosque 

Outreach for Intelligence Gathering, Am. Civil Liberties Union, https://www.aclu.org/other/ 

aclu-eye-fbi-alert-mosque-outreach-intelligence-gathering?redirect=aclu-eye-fbi-alert-mosque-outreach-intelligence-gathering (last visited Sept. 20, 2016). 53 James Gordon Meek, Brian Ross, & Rhonda Schwartz, Feds Spied on Prominent MuslimAmericans, Report Claims, ABC News (July 9, 2014), http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/feds-spiedprominent-muslim-americans-report-claims/story?id=24370482; Faisal Gill, I was targeted because of my faith, CNN (July 10, 2014, 4:48 PM), http://www.cnn.com/2014/07/10/opinion/ 

gill-unwarranted-surveillance-muslim/. Other Muslim leaders subject to surveillance are Asim 

Ghafoor, a well-known lawyer; Hooshang Amirahmadi, a professor at Rutgers University; and 

Agha Saeed, a political science professor at California State University. Id. 54 Waleed S. Ahmed, Spying on American Muslim Leaders Betrays Advocates of Civic Engagement, Muslim Matters (July 16, 2014), http://muslimmatters.org/2014/07/16/spying-on-american-muslim-leaders-betrays-advocates-of-civic-engagement/. 55 Jessica Stern & J.M. Berger, ISIS: THE STATE OF TERROR 248–49 (2015) (noting that 

there is ‘‘a near-total lack of evidence that [CVE programs] actually prevent violent extremism 

in any meaningful way’’). 56 Peter Bergen, David Sterman, Emily Schneider, & Bailey Cahall, New America Foundation, 

Do NSA’s Bulk Surveillance Programs Stop Terrorists? 4–5 (2014), https://na-production.s3.amazonaws.com/documents/do-nsas-bulk-surveillance-programs-stop-terrorists; see also 

Mohammed A. Malik, I reported Omar Mateen to the FBI. Trump is wrong that Muslims don’t 

do our part. Wash. Post (June 20, 2016), https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/ 

2016/06/20/i-reported-omar-mateen-to-the-fbi-trump-is-wrong-that-muslims-dont-do-our-part/ 

?utmlterm=.0dfd4ce3b782 (authored by a Muslim American who reported the Orlando shooter 

Omar Mateen to the FBI in 2014 after observing suspicious activity). 

discovery contradicted multiple statements by law enforcement assuring concerned 

citizens that intelligence was not being collected at community outreach meetings.50

In 2009, an FBI initiative exploited community outreach to collect information on 

Muslim communities and build a ‘‘baseline profile of Somali individuals that are 

vulnerable to being radicalized.’’51 And in 2012, another ACLU FOIA request uncovered FBI and NYPD systemic surveillance of Middle Eastern and Muslim communities in Michigan, San Francisco, and New York City.52

Similarly, Muslim community leaders who engaged with law enforcement later 

discovered they were targets of investigations and surveillance. For example, the 

emails of Faisal Gill were subject to surveillance from 2006 to 2008 despite his service in the U.S. Navy and as a senior policy advisor in the U.S. Department of Homeland Security under George W. Bush.53 Such cases are further evidence that CVE 

programs are a ruse for counterterrorism practices that impose collective suspicion 

of millions of Muslims in America for the criminal acts of individuals with whom 

they have nothing in common.54

In sum, purported community engagement and CVE programs by law enforcement agencies have proven to be a failure in their stated objectives. They have 

alienated and stigmatized Muslim communities and legitimized anti-Muslim prejudice infecting our society. Consequently, racialized and rights violating government 

practices are then exploited by terrorists to corroborate their apocalyptic recruitment narrative that America wants to destroy Islam. 

III. CVE PROGRAMS ARE UNNECESSARY TO PREVENT DOMESTIC TERRORISM

Not only are CVE programs counterproductive, they are unnecessary. 

Like their fellow Americans, Muslim communities report suspicious criminal activity about which they have knowledge without the need for a multi-million dollar 

Government program.55 According to Peter Bergen at the New America Foundation, 

nearly 20% of terrorism plots have been prevented due to initial tips from Muslim 

communities and family members.56 Studies by the Duke Triangle Center on TerVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00075 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
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57 Charles Kurzman, Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security, Sanford School 

of Public Policy, Duke University, Muslim-American Terrorism in 2013 4 (2014), https:// 

sites.duke.edu/tcths/files/2013/06/KurzmanlMuslim-AmericanlTerrorismlinl20131.pdf. 58 See, e.g., Press Release, Office of the Press Secretary, The White House, FACT SHEET: 

The White House Summit on Countering Violent Extremism (Feb. 18, 2015), https:// 

www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2015/02/18/fact-sheet-white-house-summit-countering-violent-extremism (discussing community engagement with religious leaders and communities). 59 See Pew Research Center, Mainstream and Moderate Attitudes Muslim Americans: No 

Signs of Growth in Alienation or Support for Extremism 1 (2011), http://www.people-press.org/ 

files/legacy-pdf/Muslim%20American%20Report%2010-02-12%20fix.pdf (noting that only about 

20% of Muslims even perceive much support for extremism among the American Muslim community). 60 Lorenzo Vidino & Seamus Hughes, George Washington Univ., Program on Extremism, ISIS 

in America: From Retweets to Raqqa ix (2015), https:// cchs.gwu.edu/sites/cchs.gwu.edu/files/ 

downloads/ISIS%20in%20America%20%20Full%20Report.pdf. 61 Id. 62 Glenn Greenwald, Why Does the FBI Have to Manufacture its Own Plots if Terrorism and 

ISIS Are Such Grave Threats?, THE INTERCEPT (Feb. 26, 2015), https://theintercept.com/ 

2015/02/26/fbi-manufacture-plots-terrorism-isis-grave-threats/. 63 Human Rights Institute, Illusion of Justice Human Rights Abuses in US Terrorism Prosecutions 2 (2014), http://web.law.columbia.edu/sites/default/files/microsites/human-rights-institute/files/finallreportllillusionlofljusticel0.pdf. 64 Nicole Hong, In U.S. ISIS Cases, Informants Play a Big Role, Wall St. J. (Apr. 21, 2015, 

7:08 PM), http://www.wsj.com/articles/in-u-s-isis-cases-informants-play-a-big-role-1429636206. 65 Cora Currier & Murtaza Hussain, Letter Details FBI Plan for Secretive Anti-Radicalization 

Committees, The Intercept (Apr. 28, 2016), https://theintercept.com/2016/04/28/letter-detailsfbi-plan-for-secretive-anti-radicalization-committees/. 66 See David Talbot, Fighting ISIS Online, MIT Tech. Rev. (Sept. 30, 2015), https:// 

www.technologyreview.com/s/541801/fighting-isis-online/; Rukmini Callimachiisis, ISIS and 

the Lonely Young American, N.Y. Times (June 27, 2015), http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/28/ 

world/americas/isis-online-recruiting-american.html?lr=0. See also ISIS Online: Countering 

Terrorist Radicalization & Recruitment on the Internet & Social Media: Hearing Before the Permanent Subcomm. on Investigations, 114th Cong. 10 (2015) (testimony by Peter Bergen), http:// 

www.hsgac.senate.gov/download/bergen-testimonylpsi-2016-07-05 (‘‘Around nine out of 10 

American militants are active in online jihadist circles.’’). 67 ISIS Online: Countering Terrorist Radicalization & Recruitment on the Internet & Social 

Media: Hearing Before the Permanent Subcomm. on Investigations, 114th Cong. 4 (2016) (testimony by Peter Bergen), file:///C:/Users/Staff/Downloads/Bergen%20Testimonyl- PSI%202016-07-06.pdf. 

rorism and Homeland Security also found that American Muslim communities provided a large source of information about terrorist plots since 9/11.57

Hence, CVE programs, which overtly aim to recruit Muslims to report potential 

terrorist plots,58 are a waste of Government resources. Muslim Americans know less 

about potential plots than law enforcement agencies with a sophisticated array of 

investigative tools at their disposal.59

Most cases charging Muslims of violating anti-terrorism laws are driven by undercover agents and informants outside the knowledge of community leaders or the individual’s family. 

A 2016 George Washington Report on Extremism reported that over half (39) of 

the individuals they researched were arrested after an investigation involving an informant or undercover law enforcement officer.60 Out of the 500 anti-terrorism cases 

studies, nearly 250 involved an informant or undercover agent.61 For these reasons, 

some Muslims worry that their engagement with law enforcement may lead to their 

youth being targeted for sting operations.62

A report by Human Rights Watch and Columbia Law School’s Human Rights Institute in 2014 found that ‘‘in some cases, the Federal Bureau of Investigation may 

have created terrorists out of law-abiding individuals by conducting sting operations 

that facilitated or invented the target’s willingness to act.’’63 According to the Center 

on National Security at Fordham University School of Law, approximately 60% of 

cases against Americans in Da’esh-related charges have involved informants as compared to 30% of all terrorism indictments since 9/11.64 These results are 

unsurprising in light of the FBI’s widespread use of informants, estimated at 15,000 

domestically as of 2008, which is reportedly 10 times the number of informants active during the era of J. Edgar Hoover and COINTELPRO.65

In the cases where a Muslim (often a young male) is targeted by bona fide Da’esh 

recruiters, the process occurs on-line, in secret, and without the knowledge of the 

community leaders and family members.66 A New America Foundation report found 

that of the 62 cases examined, there was no evidence of physical recruitment by a 

militant operative, cleric, returning foreign fighter, or radicalization in prison.67

Moreover, studies of terrorism suspects show Da’esh recruits’ knowledge of Islam is 

negligible. A 2008 study of hundreds of individuals involved in terrorism and terVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00076 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
73 

68 Alan Travis, MI5 Report Challenges Views on Terrorism in Britain, THE GUARDIAN (Aug. 

20, 2008), https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2008/aug/20/uksecurity.terrorism1. 69 Leaked ISIS Docs Show 70% of Recruits Don’t Even Know What Islam Is, OffGuardian 

(Aug. 22, 2016), https://off-guardian.org/2016/08/22/leaked-isis-docs-show-70-of-recruits-donteven-know-what-islam-is/. 70 Yasmeen Abutaleb & Kristina Cooke, A teen’s turn to radicalism and the U.S. safety net 

that failed to stop it, Reuters (June 6, 2016, 2:20 PM), http://www.reuters.com/investigates/ 

special-report/usa-extremists-teen/. 71 Michael Hirsh, Inside the FBI’s Secret Muslim Network, Politico Magazine (March 24, 

2016), http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/03/fbi-muslim-outreach-terrorism-213765 

(noting Harvard terrorism expert Jessica Stern conclusion that the relative prosperity and assimilation of American Muslims starkly contrasts with Muslims in Europe where the latter experience disparities in employment and wages as well as overpolicing). 72 See The Clarion Project, Special Report: The Islamic State 6 (2015), http:// 

www.clarionproject.org/sites/default/files/islamic-state-isis-isil-factsheet-1.pdf (explaining that 

Da’esh is a political organization that uses religion to justify its goals). 73 See The Impact of ISIS on the Homeland and Refugee Resettlement: Hearing Before the U.S. 

Senate Comm. on Homeland Sec. & Governmental Affairs, 114th Cong. 10 (2015) (testimony of 

Peter Bergen), http://www.hsgac.senate.gov/hearings/lessons-from-the-paris-terrorist-attacksramifications-for-the-homeland-and-refugee-resettlement. 74 Del Quentin Wilber, FBI says fewer Americans now try to join Islamic State, L.A. Times 

(May 11, 2016, 2:49 PM), http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-comey-fbi-20160511-snapstory.html. 75 Besheer Mohamed, A new estimate of the U.S. Muslim population, Pew Research Ctr. (Jan. 

6, 2016), http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/01/06/a-new-estimate-of-the-u-s-muslimpopulation/ (stating that Pew Research Center estimates that 3.3 million Muslims lived in the 

United States in 2015). 76 Julian Hattem, FBI: More than 200 Americans have tried to fight for ISIS, The Hill, (July 

8, 2015), http://thehill.com/policy/national-security/247256-more-than-200-americans-tried-tofight-for-isis-fbi-says; How many Americans have joined ISIS, CBS News (August 22, 2014), 

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/how-many-americans-have-joined-isis/ (reporting that as of August 2014, fewer than 12 Americans have been confirmed to have joined ISIS in Syria and Iraq). 77 Lorenzo Vidino & Seamus Hughes, George Washington Univ., Program on Extremism, ISIS 

in America: From Retweets to Raqqa ix (2015), https://cchs.gwu.edu/sites/cchs.gwu.edu/files/ 

downloads/ISIS%20in%20America%20-%20Full%20Report.pdf. 

rorism financeity by the British intelligence agency MI–5 found that most of them 

were ‘‘religious novices,’’ and that a ‘‘well-established religious identity actually protects against violent radicalization.’’68 A recent leak of Da’esh documents showed 

that 70 percent of recruits had a remedial understanding of Islam, and often were 

alienated from mainstream Muslim communities.69

Thus, Director of Community Partnerships at DHS George Selim’s statement in 

a Reuters article that ‘‘[g]iven the current scope of the threat, we believe family 

members, friends, coaches, teachers are best placed to potentially prevent and intervene in the process of radicalization’’ is unsupported by evidence.70 Unless the Government wants Muslims to actively spy on each other’s on-line activities in contravention of fundamental American values, CVE programs will only waste Government resources and alienate otherwise well-integrated American communities.71

In the end, irrational prejudices animate the false assumption that each Muslim 

has knowledge of and is responsible for all other Muslims’ actions. Like all other 

Americans, Muslims deserve to be presumed innocent and treated as individuals, 

not collectively guilty based on the criminal acts of a few individuals who misappropriate religious doctrine to engage in politically-motivated violence.72

IV. CVE PROGRAMS ARE A WASTE GOVERNMENT RESOURCES

Senior Government officials have gone on the record stating that the threat of 

Americans joining Da’esh is diminishing. According to Francis Taylor, Under Secretary of the Office of Intelligence and Analysis for DHS, in 2015 there was no specific, credible, imminent threat to the homeland from Da’esh.73 In October 2015, FBI 

Director James Comey testified before Congress that fewer Americans are attempting to travel to Syria to join Da’esh.74

Moreover, the data does not corroborate a sufficient security threat to warrant a 

Nation-wide CVE program. The FBI estimates that approximately 200 Muslim 

Americans (out of 3 to 6 million)75 have attempted to join Da’esh in Syria and 

Iraq.76 In 2015, a George Washington University report by the Project on Extremism estimated the total number of Americans who have traveled to Syria and Iraq 

since 2011 was 250 out of 30,000 foreign fighters worldwide and over 5,000 from 

Europe.77

74 

78 ISIS Online: Countering Terrorist Radicalization & Recruitment on the Internet & Social 

Media: Hearing Before the Permanent Subcomm. on Investigations, 114th Cong. 14 (2016) (testimony by Peter Bergen), file:///C:/Users/Staff/Downloads/Testimony-Bergen-2015-11-19-REVISED.pdf. 79 Karl Vick, New Study Says U.S. Threat from Returning Jihadis Is Low, Time (Mar. 25, 

2016), http://time.com/4272307/isis-foreign-jihadis-threat/; Julian Hattem, Spy chief: No 

threat from Americans who aided militants in Syria, The Hill (Mar. 2, 2015 1:52 PM), http:// 

thehill.com/policy/defense/234322-spy-chief-no-threat-from-returning-americans-who-fought-insyria. 80 The Impact of ISIS on the Homeland and Refugee Resettlement: Hearing Before the U.S. 

Senate Comm. on Homeland Sec. & Governmental Affairs, 114th Cong. 13 (2015) (testimony of 

Peter Bergen), http://www.hsgac.senate.gov/hearings/lessons-from-the-paris-terrorist-attacksramifications-for-the-homeland-and-refugee-resettlement. 81 Permanent Subcomm. on Investigations, Federal Support for and Involvement in State and 

Local Fusion Centers, Majority and Minority Staff Report, https://www.hsgac.senate.gov/ 

subcommittees/investigations/media/investigative-report-criticizes-counterterrorism-reportingwaste-at-state-and-local-intelligence-fusion-centers. 82 Id. 83 Charles Kurzman & David Schanzer, Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security, Sanford School of Public Policy, Duke University, Law Enforcement Assessment of Violent 

Extremism Threat 7–9 (2015), https://sites.duke.edu/tcths/files/2013/06/Kurzmanl SchanzerlLawlEnforcementlAssessmentloflthelViolentl Extremistl Threatl final.pdf. 84 Linda Qiu, Fact-checking a comparison of gun deaths and terrorism deaths, Politifact (Oct. 

5, 2015, 11:55 AM), http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/oct/05/viralimage/fact-checking-comparison-gun-deaths-and-terrorism-/. 85 Mass Shootings—2015, Gun Violence Archive (2015), http://www.pbsgunviolencearchive.org/newshour/rundown/2015-the-year-of-reports/mass-shootings/2015?page=13. 86 Brian Michael Jenkins, Fifteen Years On, Where Are We In the ‘‘War on Terror’’?, CTC 

SENTINEL, September 2016, at 7. Text from: https://www.ctc.usma.edu/v2/wp-content/ 

uploads/2016/09/CTC-SENTINELlVol9Iss92.pdf. 87 R. Kleinfield, Russ Buettner, David W. Chen, & Nikita Stewart, Mass Murders Fit Profile, 

as Do Many Others Who Don’t Kill, N.Y. Times (Oct. 3, 2015), http://www.nytimes.com/2015/ 

In the United States, there has only been one reported case of a fighter returning 

and allegedly plotting an attack.78 Speaking to the Council on Foreign Relations in 

March 2015, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper stated that approximately 40 individuals have returned from Syria, and: ‘‘We have since found they 

went for humanitarian purposes or some other reason that don’t relate to plotting.’’79 Similarly, the New America Foundation found that no American fighter who 

fought in the conflict in Somalia returned to plot an attack in the United States. 

Most either died there or were taken into custody upon their return to the United 

States.80

To be sure, domestic terrorism is a security issue that must be taken seriously. 

And our law enforcement agencies have a myriad of legal and investigative tools at 

their disposal to counter terrorism based on individualized suspicious activity indicative of criminal wrongdoing. Casting a wide net of suspicion, surveillance, and investigation on Muslim communities writ large is a waste of resources that distracts 

agents from real security threats—not to mention a violation of Constitutional and 

civil rights. 

Furthermore, CVE programs are likely to be as wasteful as fusion centers. In 

2012, a bi-partisan investigation by the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on 

Investigations found that ‘‘State and local intelligence fusion centers had not yielded 

significant useful information to support Federal counterterrorism intelligence efforts.’’81 Specifically, the Permanent Committee found that intelligence produced by 

fusion centers was of ‘‘uneven quality—oftentimes shoddy, rarely timely, sometimes 

endangering citizens’ civil liberties and Privacy Act protections, occasionally taken 

from already-published public sources, and more often than not unrelated to terrorism.’’82 Ultimately, there was no evidence that fusion centers assisted in disrupting or preventing terrorism. The same Government waste and civil liberties violations are likely to occur with CVE programs. 

Our resources and policies, therefore, should be guided by the degree of the threat 

based on credible data. Fatalities from terrorism were 69 since 9/11,83 compared 

with 220,000 deaths from murders over the same period.84 In 2015 alone, 475 people 

were killed in mass shootings.85 According to the Combating Terrorism Center at 

West Point, the risk of death at the hands of terrorists in the United States approaches lottery-winning odds.86

And yet we are not seeing Government CVE programs targeting single white 

males in their thirties and forties who are the most common demographic committing mass murder. Nor are we seeing CVE programs for Christians due to rightwing groups’ misappropriation of Christian doctrine in furtherance of their violent 

political ends.87 Government hearings are not being held to debate whether violence 

75 

10/04/us/mass-murderers-fit-profile-as-do-many-others-who-dont-kill.html?lr=0 (discussing the 

difficulty with the profile of a mass shooter that fits a majority class). 88 Racial Equality, White Camelia Knights of the Ku Klux Klan (2011), http:// 

www.wckkkk.org/eql.html; Army of God, http://www.armyofgod.com/; Harry J. Bentham, ISIS 

isn’t Islamic as the Lord’s Resistance Army isn’t Christian, BELIEF NET, http:// 

www.beliefnet.com/columnists/lordre/2014/11/isis-islam-lords-resistance-army-christianity-extremism.html. 89 Parkin, William S., Steven M. Chermak, Joshua D. Freilich, & Jeff Gruenewald, Office of 

University Programs, Science and Technology Directorate, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Twenty-Five Years of Ideological Homicide Victimization in the United States of America 

(2016), https://www.start.umd.edu/pubs/STARTlCSTABlECDBl25YearsofIdeologicalHomicideVictimizationUSlMarch2016.pdf. 90 Mark Potok, The Year in Hate and Extremism, S. Poverty L. Ctr. (Feb. 17, 2016), https:// 

www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/2016/year-hate-and-extremism. 91 Id. 92 Morris Dees & J. Richard Cohen, White Supremacists Without Borders, N.Y. Times (June 

22, 2015), http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/22/opinion/white-supremacists-without-borders.html. 93 Arie Perliger, Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, Challengers From the Sidelines: 

Understanding America’s Violent Far-Right (2012), https://www.ctc.usma.edu/v2/wp-content/ 

uploads/2013/01/ChallengersFromtheSidelines.pdf; Charles Kurzman & David Schanzer, The 

Growing Right Wing Terror Threat, N.Y. Times (June 16, 2015), http://www.nytimes.com/ 

2015/06/16/opinion/the-other-terror-threat.html. 94 Arie Perliger, Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, Challengers From the Sidelines: 

Understanding America’s Violent Far-Right (2012), https://www.ctc.usma.edu/v2/wp-content/ 

uploads/2013/01/ChallengersFromtheSidelines.pdf. 95 Forsyth deputy shot, suspect dead, courthouse evacuated, ajc.com (June 6, 2014), http:// 

www.ajc.com/news/news/police-activity-around-forsyth-courthouse/ngFsZ/. 96 JJ MacNab, What Las Vegas Police Killings Show About Evolving Sovereign Movement, 

Forbes (June 13, 2014), http://www.forbes.com/sites/jjmacnab/2014/06/13/what-las-vegas-police-killings-show-about-evolving-sovereign-movement/#2e27c38d57be. 97 Carissa Wolf, Peter Holley, & Wesley Lowery, Armed men, led by Bundy brothers, take over 

federal building in rural Oregon, Wash. Post (Jan. 3, 2016), https://www.washingtonpost.com/ 

news/post-nation/wp/2016/01/03/armed-militia-bundy-brothers-take-over-federal-building-inrural-oregon/?utmlterm=.72d2b63a4e19. 

perpetrated by the Klu Klux Klan, the Army of God, or the Lord’s Resistance Army 

should be called ‘‘radical Christian terrorism.’’88

The Southern Poverty Law Center found at least 100 plots, conspiracies and racist 

rampages since 1995 aimed at waging violence against the United States Government. The National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism found that between 1990 and 2014, far-right domestic extremists perpetrated 

four times as many ideologically-based homicidal incidents than extremists associated with al-Qaeda and associated groups.89

From 2000 to 2015, the number of hate groups has increased by 56%, which include a large number of anti-immigrant, anti-LGBT, anti-Muslim, and anti-Government ‘‘Patriot’’ groups. And from 2014 to 2015 the number of radical right-wing 

groups increased by 14 percent.90 For example, Klu Klux Klan chapters increased 

from 72 in 2014 to 190 in 2015. Self-described ‘‘Patriot’’ groups with an anti-Government agenda grew from 874 in 2014 to 998 in 2015. Stormfront, a White Nationalist 

on-line hate forum, had more than 300,000 registered members in 2015 with an average annual increase of 25,000 new users.91 White supremacist on-line forums also 

radicalized Dylaan Roof, the alleged shooter in the massacre of 9 African Americans 

at Charleston’s Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church on June 17, 2015.92

The rise in right-wing violent extremisms has resulted in 337 attacks per year in 

the decade after 9/11, causing a total of 254 fatalities, according to a study by Arie 

Perliger, a professor at the United States Military Academy’s Combating Terrorism 

Center.93 One chilling case in January 2011 involved a neo-Nazi who hid a bomb 

packed with fishing weights coated with rat poison in a backpack in the route of 

the Martin Luther King Day parade in Spokane, Washington.94

In June 2014, a violent extremist associated with the right-wing Sovereign Citizens movement shot police officers with an assault rifle during his attack on a courthouse in Fortyth County, Georgia.95 That same year in Nevada, anti-Government 

militants associated with Sovereign Citizens shot 2 police officers in a restaurant 

and placed over their bodies a ‘‘Don’t Tread on Me’’ flag, a swastika-stamped manifesto, and note that read ‘‘This is the start of the revolution.’’96 In early 2016, 150- 

armed white Christian ‘‘militia’’ members occupied a Federal building and took over 

several acres of Federal land.97

In comparison, an average of 9 Muslims per year—out of 3 to 6 million—have 

been involved in an annual average of 6 terrorism-related plots against targets in 

the United States. While most were disrupted, the 20 plots that were carried out 

76 

98 Charles Kurzman & David Schanzer, The Growing Right-Wing Terror Threat, N.Y. Times 

(June 16, 2015), http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/16/opinion/the-other-terror-threat.html?l- r=0. 99 Charles Kurzman & David Schanzer, Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security, Sanford School of Public Policy, Duke University, Law Enforcement Assessment of Violent 

Extremism Threat 4 (2015), https://sites.duke.edu/tcths/files/2013/06/Kurzmanl Schanzerl Lawl EnforcementlAssessmentl ofl thel Violentl Extremistl Threatl final.pdf. 100 Id. 101 Charles Kurzman & David Schanzer, The Growing Right-Wing Terror Threat, N.Y. Times 

(June 16, 2015), http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/16/opinion/the-other-terror-threat.html?l- r=0. 102 David Schanzer, et al., Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security, Sanford 

School of Public Policy, Duke University, The Challenge and Promise of Using Community Policing Strategies to Prevent Violent Extremism 21–22 (2016), https://sites.duke.edu/tcths/files/ 

2013/06/2015-full-report-FINAL1.pdf. 103 Id. at 19. 104 According the Pew Forum on Religious and Public Life, 65% of Muslims are foreign born, 

35% are U.S. born, and approximately 20% all Muslims are African Americans. Section 1: A Demographic Portrait of Muslim Americans, Pew Research Ctr. (Aug. 30, 2011), http:// 

www.people-press.org/2011/08/30/section-1-a-demographic-portrait-of-muslim-americans/. 105 Id. 

accounted for 50 fatalities between 2001 and 2014, excluding the 9/11 terrorist attacks.98

A 2015 Duke University research study found that over 74% of 382 local and 

State agencies rated anti-Government extremism as one of the top 3 terrorist 

threats in their jurisdiction.99 This is compared to 39% rating al-Qaeda or likeminded terrorists as a top threat.100 When asked to rank 1 to 5 the terrorist threat 

in their jurisdiction, 149 departments out of 170 ranked ‘‘other’’ forms of terrorism 

as a higher threat than al-Qaeda and associated terrorism. Similarly, only 3 percent 

identified the threat of Muslim violent extremists as severe, as compared to 7 percent for anti-Government and other forms of violent extremists.101

When Duke University researchers asked law enforcement agencies why they did 

not have a CVE program tailored for right-wing extremist groups, agents noted it 

would be a waste of time because the right-wing extremists live in the shadows and 

do not communicate their criminal activity to white communities.102 The same reality applies to terrorism plotters who claim to be Muslims. They do not tell Muslim 

community leaders or family members about their criminal plans. Nor do they become recruited by international terrorists in open forums where interventions by civilians are a possibility. 

Indeed, Muslims interviewed in the Duke University study were asked about the 

efficacy of CVE programs, respondents expressed frustration that the Government 

and fellow Americans expected them to have knowledge of every fringe element that 

claims to share their faith whereas other faith traditions are not imposed with the 

same burden.103 Not only are such expectations impractical, they are un-American. 

We are a country founded on rule of law where each individual is responsible for 

her individual acts, not for the acts of others who happen to share the same race, 

ethnicity, gender, religion, or other characteristics. CVE programs contravene this 

fundamental American principle. 

To be sure, we should not be creating CVE programs based on religious identities—whether Christian, Muslim, Jewish, or otherwise. But the unabashed focus on 

Muslims in Government efforts to counter politically-motivated violence in America 

demonstrates the Government’s disparate treatment of faith communities. 

V. FUNDS FOR COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT AND RESILIENCE SHOULD BE MANAGED BY

SOCIAL SERVICE AGENCIES WITHOUT LAW ENFORCEMENT CONTROL

Muslims communities are among the most diverse in America. Comprised of races 

and ethnic backgrounds, the diversity of Muslim American communities is a testament to America’s rich cultural heritage. Nearly 70% of Muslims are foreign-born 

and 20% are African American.104 For decades, Muslim engineers, doctors, lawyers, 

professors, and other professionals have contributed their skills and strong work 

ethic toward America’s economic prosperity. Similarly, Muslims are entrepreneurs 

who operate businesses that create jobs and grow our economy. As a result, 14% of Muslims earn a household income over $100,000 compared to 16% of the general population and 13% of Muslim households earn $50,000 to 

$74,999 compared to 15% of the general population. Accordingly, a Pew Research 

Center study in 2011 found that Muslims are mostly mainstream and well-integrated into American society.105

However, like many other American communities, Muslim American communities 

include a significant number of low-income families. The Pew Research Forum found 

77 

106 Muslim Americans: No Signs of Growth in Alienation or Support for Extremism, Pew Research Ctr. (Aug. 30, 2011), http://www.people-press.org/2011/08/30/muslim-americans-nosigns-of-growth-in-alienation-or-support-for-extremism/. 107 Poverty Guidelines, U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (Jan. 25, 2016), https:// 

aspe.hhs.gov/poverty-guidelines. 108 Muslim Americans: No Signs of Growth in Alienation or Support for Extremism, Pew Research Ctr. (Aug. 30, 2011), http://www.people-press.org/2011/08/30/muslim-americans-nosigns-of-growth-in-alienation-or-support-for-extremism/. 109 See Khaled A. Beydoun, Between Indigence, Islamophobia, and Erasure: Poor and Muslim 

in ‘‘War on Terror’’ America, CALIFORNIA LAW REVIEW (forthcoming 2016), available at 

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstractlid=2685840. 110 Id. 111 Id. 112 Alejandro Beutel, Using Local Public-Private Partnerships to Reduce Risk of Violent Extremism, BRINK NEWS (Aug. 6, 2015), http://www.brinknews.com/using-local-public-privatepartnerships-to-reduce-risk-of-violent-extremism/. 113 James Stavridis & John R. Allen, Expanding the U.S. Military’s Smart-Power Toolbox, 

Wall St. J. (June 9, 2016, 12:03 PM), http://www.wsj.com/articles/expanding-the-u-s-militaryssmart-power-toolbox-1465425489. 

that in 2011 45% of Muslim households earned less than $30,000 compared to 36% 

of the general public and only 33% of Muslims were homeowners compared to 58% 

of the general public.106 With the poverty line at approximately $28,000 for a family 

of 5 and $32,000 for a family of 6,107 a third of Muslims in America are on the verge 

of poverty. Moreover, 17% of Muslims were unemployed compared to 12 percent of 

the general public and 29 percent were under-employed compared to 20 percent of 

the general public.108

Professor Khaled Beydoun’s research on the experiences of low-income Muslims 

in America at a time when Islamophobia has reached unprecedented levels demonstrates the need for social services in many Muslim American communities.109 Indeed, as a stand-alone faith-group—Muslims are comparatively poorer than the 

broader American polity.110 In some Muslim communities, the poverty rate is alarmingly high. For example, 82% of the estimated 80,000 Somali Americans living in 

Minnesota are near or below the poverty line. In Brooklyn, nearly 54% of 

Bangladeshi Americans are low-income or below the poverty line and many Yemeni 

American families who live in high cost cities such as New York, Detroit, and the 

Bay Area are low-income.111

The consequent social and economic challenges faced by some Muslims in America—not inflated terrorism threats based on fear and prejudice—should determine 

how we spend Government resources. For example, some Muslim leaders such as 

Los Angeles-based cleric Jihad Saafir, believe local gangs pose the most immediate 

threat to community safety, not home-grown violent extremists.112 As such, Government resources are more wisely spent on investing in education, employment, 

health, and other social services that empower diverse Muslim communities to 

thrive and prosper. 

In doing so, funds currently allocated to CVE should be redirected to social service 

agencies with the expertise and institutional mission to assist new immigrant and 

low-income communities. Law enforcement should only get involved if there is individualized suspicion of predicate criminal acts in accordance with the U.S Constitution and civil rights. 

Indeed, the proposal to decouple law enforcement from community development 

is consistent with Pentagon officials’ determination that civilian programs abroad 

led by the U.S Agency for International Development were more effective in mitigating the circumstances that may lead some vulnerable youth to being recruited 

by terrorist groups.113

Government programs funded and controlled by State and Federal social service 

agencies, such as the departments of education and health and human services, will 

also facilitate community involvement in setting the agenda based on the diverse 

communities’ needs. This will bolster community-Government partnerships. Communities can focus on working with qualified social services experts in addressing community development challenges rather than worry that their involvement will be exploited by law enforcement to surveil their communities, violate their civil liberties, 

and legitimize discrimination by private actors. 

VI. CONCLUSION

We live in a world where opportunities and conflicts cross borders with ease. New 

technologies and advances in international travel have created unprecedented 

possibilites for citizens across the world to interact and exchange ideas for the common good. 

78 

114 Peter Romaniuk, Global Center on Cooperative Security, Does CVE Work? Lessons Learned 

from the Global Effort to Counter Violent Extremism, Global Center on Cooperative Security 

(September 2015), http://www.globalcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Does-CVEWorkl2015.pdf. 115 Muslim Vendor Gets No Credit in Helping to Foil Times Square Bomb Plot, Democracy 

Now! (May 6, 2010), http://www.democracynow.org/2010/5/6/muslimlvendorlgetslnolcreditlin. 

However, violent non-state actors with political agendas are exploiting new technologies and seamless borders to manipulate vulnerable individuals. They use myriad ideological doctrines to lend credence to their perverse political motivations. 

In confronting these violent actors, we cannot afford to adopt an ‘‘us versus them’’ 

approach. We must unite as Americans to ensure we are all safe and secure from 

both state and nonstate violence. Doing so entails staying true to our fundamental 

American values. The most pertinent of which is our commitment to individual responsibility for individual wrongdoing, regardless of one’s religion, race, or creed. 

Unfortunately, CVE programs undermine rather than promote these values as 

well as American security. The securitization of Muslim communities as potential 

terrorists legitimizes the pervasive anti-Muslim prejudice and bigotry infecting our 

society today. Consequently, private actors are emboldened to harass, assault, and 

even kill fellow citizens who are or perceived to be Muslim. Meanwhile, CVE programs ignore the rise of right-wing extremists—who often target Muslims in hate 

crimes.114 All of which is exploited by Da’esh to validate its twisted narrative that 

America is at war with Islam. 

In addition, the data does not support the need for a law enforcement-led CVE 

program targeting Muslim communities. Long before the White House CVE initiative in 2010, Muslims in America have informed law enforcement when they have 

knowledge of criminal activity. Indeed, Muslims have also actively stopped attempted terrorism by other Muslims. For example, a Muslim vendor in New York 

City was the first to spot smoke coming out of an SUV in the Times Square attempted bombing. His immediate communication with law enforcement was instrumental in preventing the loss of life.115 Thus, spending tens of millions of dollars 

on CVE programs especially for Muslim communities is not only stigmatizing, it is 

unnecessary and wasteful. 

Independent of flawed CVE programs and specious radicalization theories, our 

Government resources are well-spent investing in new immigrant and low-income 

communities who face unique social and economic challenges. As a country that 

prides itself in offering the opportunity for social mobility to citizens willing and 

able to work hard, investing in community development is a worthy endeavor. 

Funds that would otherwise be wasted on ill-fated CVE programs instead should 

be given to social services agencies with the expertise to support the diverse Muslim 

American communities in need of job training, physical and mental health services, 

youth programs, educational opportunities, and other services that build community 

resilience. And rather than make such programs available only to a particular religion or race, they should be available to communities based on need. 

Fifteen years after the tragic 9/11 attacks, most Muslims in America want nothing 

more than to be actively and constructively engaged in American society. They welcome working with their Government and fellow citizens to ensure all Americans 

have equal opportunity to thrive and be safe. But they are thwarted from doing so 

by racialized Government programs that treat them as outsiders and fifth columns 

rather than partners and equal citizens. 

It is long overdue to rethinking our counterterrorism policies and practices to 

make them less discriminatory and more compliant with our Constitution to continue America’s relative success in integrating communities of all faiths, races, and 

immigrant status. 

Mr. PERRY. Thank you, Ms. Aziz. 

The Chair now recognized Ms. Qudosi for her testimony. 

STATEMENT OF SHIREEN QUDOSI, SENIOR CONTRIBUTOR, 

COUNTERJIHAD.COM 

Ms. QUDOSI. Thank you for the invitation to speak. I am grateful 

for a critical opportunity to speak on this issue that is very close 

to my heart at this critical point in our Nation’s history. I ask that 

my written testimony be submitted into record. 

Mr. PERRY. Without objection, so ordered. 

79 

Ms. QUDOSI. I appreciate that all of you have taken time today 

to come here and discuss radical Islam. But just as we evolve from 

the war on terror to radical Islam, we must really take the next 

evolutionary leap and realize that we are dealing with a political 

ideology. 

We are dealing with a political parasite that is feeding off of a 

religion, and that religion is already complex by being both peaceful and warmongering. Islamism is a political philosophy with its 

own rich intellectual and religious history. Muslim reformers today 

are a beacon of hope in a challenging time. But we are not an 

anomaly. 

Muslim reformers are a resurgence of free-thinkers that have 

historically been silenced for political gain by other Muslim groups. 

The first group were called the Hiwadij, a fierce group of freethinkers who opposed the caliphate system in the early years after 

the prophet’s death. Today you will hear Muslim grievance professionals call the Hiwadij a band of outlaws and link them with ISIS, 

the very thing that the Hiwadij were against. 

Next, we have the Mutazilites who failed to birth a national and 

liberal peaceful Islam because they lacked political support. Today 

we have the reformers. 

Political support has and always will be necessary to challenge 

the system of Islamism and the monolith it has become in the last 

century. Today that system is protected by Muslims who refuse to 

recognize the challenges we face and the hand that Islamism plays. 

Whether we are looking at jihadis or radicals, Islamists or full 

progressives, which are leftists who refuse to recognize the reality 

of the situation, these groups enjoy Western liberty but have no interest in honoring or extending that liberty once their goals are secured. 

Here is an example. We already see how these groups use shame 

tactics and exclusionary practices to silence minority voices in 

Islam, voices like mine, all the while crying that they themselves 

are a minority in America in need of special protection. How does 

this espouse liberal values? The fact is, millions of Muslim Americans will not suffer if they are offended. The truth is, Islam is not 

a race. It is not in our blood. It is an idea. It is just an idea. 

Because of this, it is impossible to be Islamophobic, racist, or a 

bigot if you question an idea. It is not hate speech to speak the 

truth or to ask necessary questions. In the fight against Islamism, 

one of the first steps we need to take is to cut the reins on language and allow this country to have a real shot at winning this 

by having free and open conversations, just like we expect free and 

open elections. 

In that vein, the first point of any litmus test today is seeing 

which one of us is asking a question and which one of us is saying 

a question doesn’t need to be asked. If we want to see more critical 

thinkers in Islam, if we want to make more voices heard for human 

dignity, then we need political support and we need a landscape 

that remembers the best of America, bold and unapologetic truthfulness. 

The political ideology of Islam is a means to break. At the same 

time, we have to discuss Islamic theology as well if we want to get 

to the heart of the problem as it impacts radicalization and CVE 

80 

1 Andrew C. McCarthy, Willful Blindness: A Memoir of the Jihad. Encounter Books (2008) 

https://www.amazon.com/Willful-Blindness-Andrew-C-Mccarthy/dp/1594032130. 2 ‘‘San Bernardino shooting updates,’’ LA Times. December 9, 2015. http://www.latimes.com/ 

local/lanow/la-me-ln-san-bernardino-shooting-live-updates-htmlstory.html 3 ‘‘US Visa U.S. Visa Process Missed San Bernardino Wife’s Online Zealotry,’’ New York 

Times, December 12, 2015. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/13/us/san-bernardino-attacksus-visa-process-tashfeen-maliks-remarks-on-social-media-about-jihad-were-missed.html?lr=0. 

efforts. I want to stress that both Islamism and radical Islam need 

to be tackled. The former creates a ripe breeding ground for the 

latter. 

Ultimately what is going to be most effective in defeating radical 

Islam is not just programs, but to deploy change agents, like reformers, and help spark movements that break the ideology from 

within. We need to be culturally and philosophically combative and 

find, source, identify, and create those allies. 

The CVE program is like a math problem that asks you to answer what 2 plus 2 equals and then asks you to use the alphabet 

to form an answer. It is impossible. It doesn’t work that way. The 

fact is, no CVE program currently in play is as powerful as Muslim 

change agents with a National, if not global, platform. That is how 

you win this. Thank you for your time. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Qudosi follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF SHIREEN QUDOSI

SEPTEMBER 22, 2016 

Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee, Ladies and Gentlemen: My name is 

Shireen Qudosi. I am a Muslim Reformer. I am a conservative and a feminist. I am 

an immigrant of Pakistani and Afghan heritage. I have traveled through Iran and 

Turkey, and was a refugee in Germany before I was lucky enough to become an 

American citizen. The experiences which shape my identity puts me in a unique position from which to view the larger war against radical Islam. My testimony will 

largely elaborate on the following points: • Muslim Reform acknowledges that Islam must change in order to be compatible 

with life in our free society. • Islamism is neither a harmless alternative lifestyle nor a collection of harmless 

beliefs; it is a political system with definable ideas, an intellectual history and, 

alarmingly, a relatively robust base of support within the United States. • A government and civil society emphasis on combatting ‘‘Islamophobia’’ actually 

prevents any hope at Muslim Reform, because it protects Islam from criticism 

from non-Muslims and Muslims alike. It must be stopped. 

As a Muslim Reformer, I am committed to reform within Islam. As a mainstream 

doctrinal system of law and belief, Islam is in desperate need of change in order 

to make peace with the values we expect from life in a 21st Century liberal democracy or free society. 

Fifteen years ago, the need for change within Islam would have been an 

unremarkable and obvious observation recognized by Republicans and Democrats. 

One could hear the truth of this message both on Fox News and on MSNBC, from 

Muslim and non-Muslim voices alike. 

Today, however, even uttering this truth is uncomfortable and politically incorrect, in elite media, think tanks, NGOs—and especially within the capitals of Western nations. I believe this unwillingness to speak the truth on the part of those who 

are responsible for leading and keeping us secure is intimately tied to the current 

strategic incoherence of what was once called the War on Terror. 

That strategic incoherence takes the form of what has, I believe, been aptly described by former Federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy as ‘‘Willful Blindness’’ to 

the definable characteristics of the jihad around us.1 The core of military strategy, 

Sun Tzu tells us, is know your enemy and to know yourself. It is impossible to defeat what you do not, first, understand. 

For instance, on December 2, 2015, the San Bernardino shootings occurred.2 One 

of the shooters, an immigrant from Pakistan named Tashfeen Malik, passed at least 

three security screenings to be admitted, then helped murder 14 Americans.3 How 

could this happen? Because the public servants trying to screen out ‘‘violent extremVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00084 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
81 

4 ‘‘ ‘Islam is Peace,’ Says President: Remarks by the President at Islamic Center of Washington, D.C.’’ https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2001/09/20010917- 

11.html Video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lZoroJdVnA. 5 ‘‘Why Won’t Obama Say Radical Islam?’’ NBC News, June 13, 2016. http:// 

www.nbcnews.com/storyline/orlando-nightclub-massacre/why-won-t-obama-say-radical-islamn591196. 

ists’’ are barred by law to look for Islamists or evidence of political commitment 

masquerading as religious belief. 

In addition to leaving us vulnerable to physical attack, ‘‘Willful Blindness’’ has 

taken an important cognitive toll, as well. For example, President Bush and members of his administration famously tried to extend a hand of friendship to Muslims 

after 9/11, by saying, ‘‘Islam is peace.’’4 I am certain they believed it and said it 

in good faith—as do many Muslims who also say the same today. 

Specifically, with regards to Islam, however, the truth is more complicated. The 

first 12 years of Mohammed’s prophethood in Arabia was, indeed, suffused with a 

message of peace. What followed the Prophet’s transition to political and military 

leader, though, was predominantly the establishment and maintenance of a Muslim 

nation through force and domination. Islamic scholars refer to these distinct 

phases—delineated by verses in the Qur’an—as either belonging to the Mecca or 

Medina periods, respectively. That legacy of violence and domination continued in 

the years after the prophet’s death through the establishment of a Caliphate. 

Reformers and others can contextualize this ugly history, recasting and rechanneling its lessons for the Muslims of today. But by proclaiming that, simply, ‘‘Islam 

is peace,’’ we are distorting the story. Worse, we are ignoring great bulk of Islamic 

law dealing with relations between the Muslim community and its non-Muslim 

neighbors which emerged during the Medina period. You will find these verses in 

the Qur’an, which many Muslims consider the uncreated word of God: • ‘‘Soon shall We cast terror into the hearts of the Unbelievers, for that they 

joined companions with Allah, for which He had sent no authority.’’ (Q 3:151) • ‘‘I will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve. Therefore strike off 

their heads and strike off every fingertip of them’’ (Q 8:12) 

These are among the verses that, underscored through scholarship codified into 

Islamic law or Sharia, form the doctrine justifying and encouraging every jihadi attack today. 

A more correct way to put it would be, ‘‘Islam is peace and war.’’ Censoring the 

word ‘‘war’’ does nothing to alter what Islam is or isn’t. Those who do this try to 

press the truth into a narrative they, understandably, are more comfortable facing. 

Refusing to acknowledge the obvious, though, only undercuts people like me who are 

working at real, doctrinal reform. 

President Obama and members of his administration have taken the mistaken 

mantra that ‘‘Islam is peace’’ several steps forward in the same, misguided direction. 

Not only do they refuse to utter the words, ‘‘Islamic terrorism,’’ they argue that even 

speaking those words is counterproductive and damaging to our efforts to combat 

it.5

They have so thoroughly disassociated cause and effect that they view acts of violent terrorism (now called the meaningless euphemism, ‘‘extremism’’) as completely 

separate both from the world’s Muslim population and the doctrines of Islamic religious law. 

Instead, the lens through which the President and others see this conflict playing 

out, especially within the United States and its Muslim population, is as a conflict 

between races and identities or between majority and minority individuals and communities rather than one between competing political systems. Perhaps this is to 

be expected in the context of America’s history on recent civil rights battlegrounds; 

it is, in this case, incorrect. 

The obsession with stamping out the public’s ‘‘Islamophobia’’ in the mold of previous anti-racism campaigns moves Islam from a religion into a racial or biological 

context. Islam is a religion—that is, it is merely set of concepts and beliefs. As such, 

ideas, concepts, and beliefs do not have human rights; individuals do. 

The most targeted and slandered voices today under ‘‘Islamophobia’’ are those 

who take aim at those ideas, not people. By calling criticism of the tenants of Islam 

or its doctrines ‘‘Islamophobic’’ or ‘‘hateful’’ speech, we are placing a political system 

beyond the reach of criticism—and ultimately, any analysis at all, in fear of causing 

offense. 

This isn’t theoretical; the censorship of threat-focused training materials for law 

enforcement and the intelligence community is something that happened under the 

Obama administration. At the urging of Islamists groups beginning in 2009, the Departments of Justice, Defense, Homeland Security, and the Central Intelligence 

82 

6 ‘‘Lawmaker Questions FBI Materials Purge,’’ Investigative Project on Terrorism, May 4, 

2012. http://www.investigativeproject.org/3566/lawmaker-questions-fbi-materials-purge. 7 ‘‘Cruz chews out Johnson over DHS ‘purge’ of ‘Islam’ references in terror reports,’’ Washington Times, June 30, 2016. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/jun/30/ted-cruzchews-out-jeh-johnson-over-dhs-purge-of-j/ 8 ‘‘How Islam got political: Founding fathers,’’ BBC News, November 10, 2005. http:// 

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uklnews/4424208.stm. 

Agency came under attack for so-called ‘‘Islamophobic’’ analysis that dealt with the 

enemy threat doctrine in general—and Islamic law and the Muslim Brotherhood in 

particular.6 Eventually, these efforts proved successful, as the agencies purged 

training materials, cancelled lectures, fired personnel, and essentially stopped teaching who the enemy is.7

The doctrines of Islam are not a race or a protected class; they are not human 

beings with rights and feelings. Political systems, like opinions, must be questioned. 

They must be lampooned and mocked and derided—not because they are all deserving of such treatment, but because ideas that we are not permitted to attack are 

the ideas that control us. 

It’s neither racist nor bigoted to say that Islamism exists, and that it is both horrific and a threat to our way of life. It is no more deserving of respect than Communism or Nazism, or any other idea or belief system in history—all of which have 

gone through rigorous scrutiny. Islam as it has evolved to a 21st Century is a political ideology that must be studied, understood, and defeated. While previous generations defeated these totalitarianisms, our leaders are now standing in their own 

way, seemingly paralyzed, avoiding the task ahead of them. 

Many who accuse others of ‘‘Islamophobia’’ believe they’re doing good, protecting 

a vulnerable minority from a majority culture they are suspicious of. What they actually do is two very dangerous things: (a) Promote the idea that the only legitimate 

expression of Islam is Islamism, and (b) ratify the Islamists’ hold on the Muslim 

community through the organizations it legitimizes through outreach. 

First, when criticism or analysis of Islam’s doctrines are not permitted lest the 

critic be accused of ‘‘Islamophobia’’ or ‘‘hate speech,’’ it becomes impossible for Muslim Reform to succeed. The version of Islam embraced by today’s Islamic authorities 

is undemocratic and totalitarian. It remains protected only because it masquerades 

as religion, when it is, rather, a tyrannical, political parasite feeding off a religion. 

Islamism is a political philosophy with its own intellectual and religious history. 

In addition, of course, to Islamic law and doctrine, in both theory and practice 

Islamism owes a debt to various modern conceptions of Western statism. Because 

of the totalitarian nature of Islamic law, it has occasionally intertwined and crosspollinated with fascism, socialism, and communism.8 It is important to note that 

Islamism has not mixed—and, in fact, does not mix—with a tradition of liberty or 

freedom. 

In the modern era, Islamism is a political movement that works to compete explicitly with our conception of Enlightenment liberal democracy in order to advance the 

role of Islam as an explicit governing system. It has its own political philosophy 

which is necessarily at odds with the Rights and Freedoms guaranteed by the U.S. 

Constitution and its Amendments. 

While I am a Muslim, I reject Islamism because I embrace our country’s Constitution, and the Rights and Freedoms it explicitly protects. A reformed Islam can coexist quite comfortably within this Constitutional framework; Islamism, on the other 

hand, is in direct conflict. Because of these views, the Obama administration has 

never included me in a meeting. And yet the thousands of Muslim Reformers still 

waiting to emerge are the only truthful allies America has in this fight. 

Defeating the global scourge of Islamism is going to require breaking the political 

ideology, and also taking on the theology. Tackling the theology through which 

Islam is understood is necessary to push past second-hand sources—such as the infallibility of the Qur’an and its Messenger. This is where Muslim Reformers—rather 

than those who would claim a meaningless descriptor of simply ‘‘moderate Muslims’’—have our work cut out for us. 

Muslim Reformers are staring up at the immense wave of Islamism about to crash 

to shore. Because the climate is hostile to us, we need all the help we can get. We 

must activate networks of truly open-minded Muslims and create a platform to amplify their voices. Presently change agents continue to work with minimal resources, 

near zero funding, and face a combative pro-censorship environment. 

Reformers must work to reinitiate a tradition of philosophical questioning that 

has been lost to Islam. Islam did not arrive as a static faith; even the Prophet’s core 

message changed substantially, leading to the abrogation of key doctrines even during his lifetime. Post-Muhammad, there were 200 years of scholarly devotion to unVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00086 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
83 

9 ‘‘Facebook Banned Me for Criticizing Islamists, But I Got the Last Laugh,’’ Shireen Qudosi, 

Counterjihad.com, September 2, 2016. http://counterjihad.com/facebook-banned-criticizingislamists-got-last-laugh. 10 ‘‘Fiqh Council of North America,’’ Muslim Brotherhood Unmasked. http:// 

www.brotherhoodunmasked.net/organizations-connected-to-the-muslim-brotherhood/fcna. 11 ‘‘Obama’s mosque visit demonstrates tacit acceptance of a form of gender apartheid,’’ New 

York Times, February 3, 2016. http://nytlive.nytimes.com/womenintheworld/2016/02/03/ 

obamas-mosque-visit-demonstrates-tacit-acceptance-of-a-form-of-gender-apartheid. 12 ‘‘Islamic American Relief Agency, Long Accused of Terror Finance, Pleads Guilty on Sanctions Violations,’’ Counterjihad.com, July 26, 2016 http://counterjihad.com/islamic-american-relief-agency-long-accused-terror-finance-pleads-guilty-sanctions-violations. 13 ‘‘CAIR’s ‘Islamophobia’ List Is a ‘Hit List,’ Say Critics,’’ Breitbart, June 23, 2016. http:// 

www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/06/23/cair-islamophobia-hitlist/. 

derstanding the faith. However, this spirit of inquiry that advanced the faith and 

the ability to re-contextualize long-established doctrines was lost. Muslim Reformers 

and their allies have successfully reinitiated a spirit of inquiry. 

Unfortunately, however, virtually every major Muslim group in America is working against the Reform project. They are working against me, as a Muslim Reformer, as I try to bring Islam into modernity. And, for this reason, they are working against you as well. 

Recently, Facebook shut me down for speaking out on reform. Islamists in the 

United States attack me for exposing them and defending truth-tellers.9 At the 

same time, Islamist front groups with ties to both terror and sedition enjoy privileged status in the media, the White House and before in Congress. 

What does it say to Muslim Reformers when the Secretary of Homeland Security 

attends the convention of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), a group 

whose Fiqh Council members have issued fatwas (rulings of Islamic law) that condone ‘‘seeking martyrdom’’ by attacking U.S. military personnel, support the murder 

of homosexuals, and oppose and condemn Muslims who ‘‘befriend’’ non-Muslims?10

What message does it send when the President gives a speech from a mosque 

where women are forced into separate and unequal spaces11 and whose prayer leader was part of an organization designated for funding terrorism?12

Or when the Department of Justice meets with groups like CAIR, which was the 

Justice department itself has said was founded as a conspiracy to support Hamas, 

they are offering an implicit support for a group which has labeled Muslim Reformers as ‘‘Islamophobes,’’ opening them up to accusations of blasphemy, apostasy, and 

even death threats?13

America isn’t simply a physical space; it is a set of shared ideals that are codified 

into law and custom. Even in a highly partisan political climate, to function fairly 

and comfortably in the United States, there is an unspoken social contract. The 

presence of citizens with Islamist ideas within a polity has consequences for citizens 

of a free society. 

In order to get a clearer picture of the danger posed by Islamism, what follows 

are some examples of values or principles on which we, as Americans, should be 

able to agree, and the Islamist doctrines that could come into conflict with each. 

You must believe that the Constitution is the supreme law of the land, not that: 

• It’s wrong to obey laws or help law enforcement officers if that might lead to 

negative consequences for you or someone else belonging to your religion (Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book R, Holding One’s Tongue, Section 

r7.0, Giving Directions to Someone Who Wants To Do Wrong, p. 743–44); 

• Laws passed by an elected Congress or a parliament are, by their very nature, 

illegal and that only laws revealed by the deity of your religion are allowed (Q 

8:39); or that 

• Any government established by laws and rules other than the ones allowed in 

your religion should be overthrown by force or subversion and replaced with one 

that only allows your religion (Q 8:39; Q 9:5; Q 9:29). 

You must believe in freedom of religion, not that: 

• Beheading [or otherwise harming] those who do not believe as you do is what 

God wants (Q 47:4); 

• Jews are an inferior people who should be denigrated and demeaned and not 

treated equally in court (Q 2:65, Q 5:60, Q 7:166); 

• Anyone outside of your religion is legally forbidden from building or repairing 

a house of worship (Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book O, Justice, 

Section o11.0, Non-Muslim Subjects of the Islamic State (Ahl al-Dhimma), p. 

607–9) (Pact of Umar); 

• Verbal or written criticism of your religious beliefs should be criminalized, possibly even by the death penalty (Reliance of the Traveler/Umdat al-Salik, Book 

84 

14 ‘‘President Obama Slams ‘Yapping’ Over ‘Radical Islam’ And Terrorism,’’ National Public 

Radio, June 14, 20016. http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/06/14/482041137/ 

president-obama-slams-yapping-over-radical-islam-and-terrorism. 

R, Holding One’s Tongue, Section r2.0, Slander, p. 730; Q 49:12; Q 104.1; Q 

68:11); • Deciding to leave the religion of your family should be a death penalty crime 

(Q 16:106); or that • Offensive warfare to force those who don’t accept your religion to submit to it 

is not only permissible but obligatory before God (Reliance of the Traveler/ 

’Umdat al-Salik, Book O, Justice, Section 01.2, p. 584; Book O, Justice, Section 

o9.0, Jihad, p. 599, Q 8:39). 

You must oppose cruel and unusual punishments, not believe that: 

• Chopping off hands and/or feet is an acceptable legal punishment for theft (Q 

5:38–39); • Lashing people in public for moral offenses, like having sex outside of marriage, 

should be the law (Q 24:2); or that • Adultery should be punished by stoning to death (Sahih al-Bukhari, ‘‘Bab al 

Janaiz, Vol. 2, p. 90; Vol. 3, ‘‘Bab al Wakalah fi al Hudud’’, p. 65; Vol. 7, ‘‘Kitab 

al Ayman’’, p. 218; Vol. 8, ‘‘Bab al Rajm,’’ pp. 24. 29. 34, 135; Sunan Al 

Tirmidhi, ‘‘Kitab al Hudud’’, Vol. 4, pp. 27, 33, 34.). 

You must value life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, not believe that: 

• A parent may kill their own child for any reason with no legal consequences 

(Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book O, Justice, Section o1.2, pp. 

583-84); • Government should enforce public dress code rules (Reliance of the Traveler/ 

’Umdat al-Salik, Book M, Marriage, Section m2.3, p 512; Section m2.7, pg. 513); • Slavery should be legal (Q 23:5, Q 70:30, Sahih Bukhari, Vol. 7, p. 137). 

You must believe that all men and women were created equal, not that: 

• A woman should have to have 4 adult male witnesses to prove she’s been raped 

or face charges of adultery (Q 24:4–5); • The word of a man in a court of law can only be countered by that of two 

women (Q 2:282); • A sister should inherit one-half what her brother inherits (Q 4:11); • A man has the right to multiple wives, but that a woman should only have one 

husband (Q 4:3); • There is no such thing as marital rape, because a man should be able to use 

his wife when and how he likes, with or without her consent (Q 2:223); or that • Females should be ‘‘circumcised’’—have their genitals mutilated—to ensure 

their chastity (Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book E, Purification, 

Section e4.3, pg. 59). 

For the most committed liberals and conservatives—the most partisan Republicans and Democrats—can you not see that the issues that divide you are relatively 

small and inconsequential in comparison? 

These doctrines are cited from the most authoritative texts within Islam, including the Qur’an, the Hadith, and recognized texts of Islamic jurisprudence. It is important to note that, while an individual Islamist could disagree personally with one 

or more of these, they are part of authoritative, Islamic law according to the rules 

of Islamic jurisprudence and by the consensus of Islamic legal scholarship. 

This means that, for Islamists, even if there is a personal distaste for some of 

these tyrannical and barbaric practices, there is nonetheless the understanding 

that, as these doctrines are part of Islamic law: (a) they will not do battle against 

them through a process of Reform; (b) they will turn a blind eye as communities 

indoctrinate their children; and (c) they will demonize anyone who raises the problem as an ‘‘Islamophobe.’’ 

No other idea in human history has ever received the level of insulation that 

Islam is receiving today. Western society needs to remember that not all things 

should be tolerated; not all ideas are equal. 

Speaking about his refusal to use the words ‘‘Islamic terrorism,’’ President Obama 

asked, rhetorically, ‘‘So, someone seriously thinks that we don’t know who we’re 

fighting?’’14

I would raise my hand emphatically. If called upon, I’d respond respectfully that, 

‘‘Mr. President, you don’t know who you’re fighting because you don’t know who or 

what you’re dealing with. You don’t see a monster for what it is because it tells you 

it isn’t a monster. Or, to carry the metaphor further, because it tells you there’s no 

such thing as monsters.’’ 

There is an inner struggle among Muslims today and growing conversations and 

collaborations that are pushing for the change that comes through critical dialogue 

85 

and exposure. Yet this evolutionary leap is being held back by a Western society 

insulating it from critical thought by the politically correct impulse to and the 

Islamist campaign to silence criticism through hysteria about ‘‘Islamophobia.’’ 

Even if Islamists never pick up a physical weapon, they are on the other side in 

this fight. The battle isn’t just an issue with ISIS, which has become the predominant focus of most leaders and public opinion. This war will never end by simply 

playing whack-a-mole and taking the fight over there. There is no ‘‘over there.’’ The 

war is taking place multiple fronts and in several forms. It is, ultimately, a war of 

ideas and the battlefield is the mind. 

Today, there is no greater challenge than the challenge of Islamism. This enemy 

does not wear a uniform; it has neither a distinguishable accent or a unified language; it does not have the same country of origin. In fact, there is nothing that 

unifies them beyond Islamist ideology. 

For this challenge we need leadership of the same character resolve that got us 

through World Wars and Cold Wars in generations past. We’re going to need leaders 

who are unafraid of being disliked, because what needs to be done to protect both 

America’s National security and the Rights and Freedoms guaranteed by our Founding documents. Nothing less will suffice. 

RECCOMENDATIONS

1. Identify and understand the ideological conveyor belt Islamists use to create 

jihadists, both outside and inside the United States. 

This process, as well as the infrastructure that supports it, is not much different in Pakistan than it is in Michigan; the foundational concepts and texts 

are the same. This means monitoring fundamentalist mosques and communities 

in addition to Islamic State websites and message boards. Law enforcement 

must be aware of the physical space rather than just the digital space. 

2. Insist that those coming to our country share our values, which means restricting the ability of known, identified Islamists to immigrate. 

This means identifying the defining characteristics of Islamism, including the 

major political parties and movements that embrace it. There are hundreds of 

such groups, and all they have in common is that they ultimately want to impose seventh-century Islam on the entire world. Just as you shouldn’t import 

jihadists, you need to also stop importing Muslims who are likely of activating 

as radicals or Islamist. It is also not good enough to import people who are tacitly compliant in the face of Islamism. This makes the job of the Muslim Reformer more difficult. 

3. Initiate outreach efforts that require new Muslim immigrants to interact with 

Muslim Reformers and secular Muslims. 

Recognizing that not everyone who needs to be kept at bay will be kept at 

bay, it is critical to allow reform-minded communities (rather than Islamist organizations) to help integrate new immigrants or refugees of Islamic background. At present, almost all new Muslim immigrants stay within an enclave 

that is racially segregated and almost impossible to penetrate. This must 

change, as it is not in the interest of social cohesion, integration, or National 

security to encourage ghettoization. 

Mr. PERRY. Thank you, Ms. Qudosi. 

The Chair recognizes himself for a period of questioning. I will 

start with Mr. Hoekstra. According to your testimony, jihadists 

have murdered at an alarming rate. These murders have skyrocketed since 2009, as you said, with nearly 30,000 killed last 

year. What do you see as the causes of this dramatic increase? I 

was going to save this question until after you answered that one, 

but maybe this question will help inform the answer to the next 

one. 

So you are already familiar with PSD–11 which, as a matter of 

fact, you made me aware of it. With that, does that affect domestic 

policy which then potentially affects the increase in these killings? 

How would you characterize that, if there is one, effect on the policy here at home and abroad? What signs, if there are any, that 

we can see that indicate the effect of that? 

86 

For instance, what many of us in Congress and around the country feel is an unwillingness by the administration to identify the 

enemy, is that enrobed, potentially, in that policy? 

Are we too close to it and is the administration wedded to that 

policy so closely that now, for the sake of embarrassment or for the 

considerations of the dramatic failures in North Africa and in the 

Middle East that they just don’t want to talk about it? So we can’t 

say radical Islam or Islamists or those type of things. I would be 

interested in hearing your thoughts. 

Mr. HOEKSTRA. All right, let me address this. The second part of 

your question, first, is what has been the impact of implementing 

a policy directive like PSD–11 domestically? The impact domestically is that there are numerous examples which we have identified 

at the Investigative Project on Terrorism, and actually have a book 

coming out next month, because the evidence is so extensive, so 

deep and so broad, about the different types of people that have 

now been coming into the United States under visas to visit, the 

meetings that have been going on with these individuals and policymakers at State and at the White House is frightening. 

There is example after example after example of individuals who 

have embraced Hamas, who have embraced suicide bombers, issued 

Fatwahs against, and the death penalty against members of the 

LGBT community who, in prior administrations, would never have 

been granted access into the United States. They would never have 

gotten a visa. 

The State Department and Homeland Security would have taken 

a look at their background, their public statements and their actions and said, no, they are not getting into the United States. 

This administration has not only welcomed them into the United 

States, has welcomed them into the policy arms of the U.S. Federal 

Government. So that is how it has expanded domestically. 

These individuals then frequently will travel around the United 

States speaking at a number of the organizations that Zuhdi has 

identified, and they will also participate in fundraising and espousing the same messages of hate that they have given overseas and 

doing the same thing here in the United States. 

Internationally, as I said, yes, you know, it is absolutely important to identify the enemy, and we have. All right? What has happened with the Obama administration is that they have narrowed 

the definition of who the enemy is by embracing with individuals 

that the Clinton administration, the Bush administration always 

would have identified as being part of the problem and identifying 

them as the enemy. 

The biggest example is the Muslim Brotherhood. Under PSD–11, 

and this is why I think it is absolutely critical that you get the information of who was vetted, how they were vetted and who we actually started to engage with. But engaging with the Muslim 

Brotherhood in Egypt and in Libya, two countries that were strong 

allies in fighting radical jihadists, OK? 

We facilitated or actively participated in their overthrow. We almost lost Egypt, all right? But thankfully, the forces that be in the 

country came back and we stopped the Muslim Brotherhood regime 

in Egypt after 1 year. We did lose Libya. So why do you see this 

87 

escalation in the number of people who are victims? Because we 

lost Northern Africa, the weapons caches. We lost intelligence. 

I mean, I was Chairman of the Intelligence Committee. We met 

with Gaddafi and his intelligence individuals. They were providing 

us with insights into the threat from radical jihadism not only in 

Libya but throughout Northern Africa and parts of the Middle 

East. Gaddafi was good at gathering intelligence of these bad folks 

because they threatened his regime. 

After 2004, he shared that information with us extensively and 

cooperated with us. After 2011 that all went dark. In Egypt, cooperation with their intelligence has gone largely dark after 2011 

because they no longer believe that they can trust us. In Iraq we 

have gone dark. 

So in a lot of these different areas where we used to get valuable 

intelligence, great participation, insights into the threat, those 

countries have now become failed states and they are havens for 

preparing, planning, and executing attacks against the United 

States. 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair thanks the gentleman. My time has expired. Since there are only two of us left, if you don’t mind, we will 

probably go a couple rounds because I have some more questions. 

But at this time, I yield to the gentlelady. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Thank you, Mr. Perry. Thank you for 

your testimony. I want to understand a couple of things. Is the 

term Islam, is that the definition of a religion? Can I equate Islam 

with Christianity, Judaism? Is it the same thing? Is it or is it not? 

Anybody? Anybody on the panel? 

Dr. JASSER. Congresswoman, I would tell you Islam is what a 

Muslim believes it to be. So my Islam is certainly, I feel, similar 

to the morals of Judaism and Christianity in my personal practice 

and what I teach my children. But the Islam of Saudi Arabia, of 

the Khomeinis of Iran is an evil supremacist doctrine. So the question is whose Islam? I think it is similar in other faiths. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Well, thank you. So that is an equation 

to a terminology from my religion—I am a Christian—Christianity, 

right? Did you have something you want to say to this? 

Ms. AZIZ. Yes. So Islam is a religion, a monolithic religion. Like 

any other religion, there are multiple interpretations. There are 

sects within the faith. Much of it is based on history. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. So is mine. 

Dr. JASSER. Monotheistic. 

Ms. AZIZ. Monotheistic, excuse me. But also if you equate a religion with criminal activity of individuals, then you are essentially 

criminalizing the—— 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. You are ahead of me. 

Ms. AZIZ [continuing]. The religion. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. You are ahead of me, because that is my 

concern. Because we have experienced in this country very heinous 

crimes, killings done by people of other religions. But we have not 

attached an -ism to it or an I–S–T to it and indict a whole religion. 

So I don’t know how that is helpful. 

Ms. QUDOSI. If I may speak? 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. When I ask you. 

Ms. QUDOSI. Sure. 

88 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Thank you. I don’t see the helpfulness in 

ascribing that to a religion and taking it into this sort of geopolitical or theopolitical environment. I will ask you—I want to 

speak to you a second, Dr. Aziz, because you said CVE is an unnecessary waste of money and in some ways it is counterproductive. 

So my question is, is there a role for either countering violent extremism through education and social services and community 

building? Or is there just no role for that in our country at this 

time? 

Ms. AZIZ. Well, first I think we need to be very careful that we 

don’t turn into thought police. If we start to criminalize and surveil 

religious beliefs, one is we may be infringing or are likely infringing on the First Amendment and opening the door to doing so with 

many other religious groups. 

The second is you have to focus on individualized activities, predicate acts for criminal activities that are reasonably suspicious. 

That will eventually lead you to the crime. These are very traditional, long-standing practices of law enforcement. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. So the issue should be for us to be developing these relationships and transform and educate our total community and as a means of prevention, preparation, and prevention, 

identification and encourage sharing. But there is a problem with 

that in your testimony, I believe, because the only agencies involved in this have a law enforcement identification. Did I get that? 

Is that accurate? 

Ms. AZIZ. Yes, law enforcement is leading the effort and social 

services agencies are effectively being co-opted. That is going to 

create distrust with communities because they are going to be worried that this is a ruse to spy on them and chill their religious freedom and political beliefs. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. That is kind-of where I also wanted to 

go. I wanted to know, since you said, is you worked in the Muslim 

community quite extensively. How does the community or the communities feel about the CVE or projectivity sort of prioritization? 

Ms. AZIZ. It has created a lot of divisions. Many organizations 

want to work with the Government in dealing with social problems, 

economic problems that face Muslim American communities, as 

they face many other communities, particularly problems that are 

associated with being low-income or being a new immigrant community where you may need particulars or—— 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. So what do you the pathway should really be? 

Ms. AZIZ. I think that the Government should take the money 

from CVE, give it to social services organizations like the Department of Education and Health and Homeland Security and focus 

on helping communities across the country that are low-income, 

that have specific social challenges, and creating healthy, thriving, 

prosperous communities. 

That, ultimately, is going to prevent all kinds of social problems 

and criminal activity from gangs to vulnerable youth who may, in 

fact, be recruited on-line, in secret, by international terrorists outside of the view of their families and their communities. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Thank you. 

89 

Ms. Qudosi, excuse me for cutting you off but you can’t mess 

with my train of thought when it is going. So allow me to let 

you—— 

Ms. QUDOSI. Thank you. 

Mrs. WATSON COLEMAN. Respond. 

Ms. QUDOSI. Thank you. To answer your question about what is 

Islam, I agree with Dr. Jasser that Islam is very personal. Islam, 

when it was birthed was meant to be a pathway, a guide in the 

monotheistic tradition of Judaism and Christianity. 

Now, this shift happened initially after the first 12 years of Mohammed’s prophethood when he went from peaceful to warmongering, if we are going to be honest. He waged jihad campaigns. 

Even if he didn’t partake in those, he instructed those. He agreed 

to those. He didn’t contest them. 

So when we talk about is a religion violent or does it excuse terror, well, we call it terror today. We call it violence today. Back 

then, that was just the way of the land, and that is the way of the 

people. 

So we have to understand that we are dealing with something 

really ancient, and it has come to this point and time. We are using 

modern language, and we are using, you know, our very limited 

scope of the last 100 years to understanding something that has 

been going on for 1,400 years. 

So in that sense, how did Islam become political? Well after the 

Prophet’s death is really when it became a monolith of a political 

identity and ideology. That started with the caliphate. 

From there on it landed into the Umayyad Dynasty. This is a 

very complex thing. So Islam, from the get-go, has been very political. That is where we have sort-of wandered off-path. 

So when we as Muslims say today that Islam isn’t political, it is 

just peace, it is not peace and war, we as Muslims don’t understand our own faith. That is the problem. So to say that CVE, for 

example, should only be given to social services also fails to understand who we are as Muslims culturally. 

There is a great agency in Southern California called Access, 

started by an Arab lady. It took her a very long time to build that 

up. But one of the challenges she had with that is that Muslims 

don’t speak out. 

If we need mental health or behavioral health, we don’t seek it. 

We don’t identify it. If we need counseling, we don’t shame ourselves, ‘‘by asking for help.’’ So trusting that social services somehow is magically going solve this is not understanding the mentality of the Muslim mindset. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. OK. Equating their religion, does that 

help them to violence and terrorism, does that encourage them to 

be outspoken on their needs and desire to participate? Thank you. 

Ms. QUDOSI. Could you clarify by equating your religion? Could 

you clarify the question? By equating religion? 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. You say that they are very quiet, they 

are very insular. They don’t speak out. My question to you is are 

you encouraging them to be more outspoken, to be more engaging, 

to be more participatory if you indict their religion as something 

that is dangerous and akin to terrorism? That was just my statement. 

90 

Ms. QUDOSI. Sure, I would love to answer that. Thank you. The 

direction that we are going with, as Muslims, is one of confrontation-conversation within ourselves and our own community, first 

and foremost. I have been talking about reform, before reform was 

even a catch phrase—16 years ago is when I first started this. The 

more I talk to Muslims, the more the conversation gets pushed 

even—— 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Excuse me. 

Mr. Chairman, I want to yield back. I am way over my time here. 

If you would like to pursue it. 

Mr. PERRY. Yes. 

Ms. QUDOSI. I can wrap it up real quick. 

Mr. PERRY. Sure. 

Ms. QUDOSI. We are going to have division in our community. 

There is going to be confrontation. These are divisive times. Going 

to a successful conclusion means having those uncomfortable conversations. So we shouldn’t be wary of division, or afraid of it. We 

should embrace it, and use that as opportunities to really push this 

dialog forward. Thank you. 

Mr. PERRY. Thank you, and the Chair thanks the gentlelady from 

New Jersey as well. 

Dr. Jasser, Secretary Johnson earlier this year in front of the 

Senate Judiciary Committee stated ‘‘If we in our efforts here in the 

homeland start giving the Islamic State the credence that they 

want to be referred to as part of Islam, or some form of Islam, we 

will get nowhere in our efforts to build bridges with Muslim communities, which we need to do in this current environment right 

now.’’ 

Now I am not a Muslim, right? So we are trying to figure this 

out, and we asked you to come and help us. A couple things come 

to mind. I think there is a doctor of Islamic theology named alBaghdadi who named the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. I am 

thinking, well, he is a doctor of the religion. As far as I know, that 

is his background. That is his education. Who am I to question 

him, if that is what he calls it? 

I wonder if there is a difference between Islamist and Islamic because we use—the Islamist term is used in the 9/11 Commission 

Report. We are trying to be very clear here, because we don’t want 

to indict a whole religion, but we need to get to the focus of the 

problem. So does the use of Islamic terms when discussing groups 

like Isis or al-Qaeda really enhance their credibility? 

Dr. JASSER. Chairman, actually not using it enhances their credibility, because what it does is it lets the loudest, most militant 

voices, and the governments and the organizations that currently 

have the mantle of Islam to dominate the conversation. 

So whenever Americans or Homeland Security or government 

wants to look up Islam, they Google Islam and go to the Islamic 

identified groups, and it is going to be those that have the heaviest 

traffic on the internet, and those that are making proclamations 

like Baghdadi was. 

At the end of the day, it then also lets the silent majority stay 

asleep. There is no reason for Muslims that I am told every day 

that agree with what I am doing. Yet they say, gosh, I don’t want 

91 

to get the targets that is on your back by doing the reform because 

when you stick your head up, it is going to get, you know, attacked. 

So at the end of the day, by denying the reality of the source, 

you are actually then it is a bigotry of low expectations, which is, 

oh, we know the president, you know, the head of the Islamic Republic of Iran doesn’t speak for all Islam, but we will let you guys 

pass on the fact that it is a homophobic, supremacist country in its 

government. 

We will pass the fact that the royal family of Saudi Arabia is actually brewing and spreading billions of dollars of ideas that are 

actually the forefathers of ISIS in their ideas. We will pass that 

fact, and let them speak for Islam. 

Because if we talk about Islam in the freest country of the world, 

then it will all turn into anti-Islamic stuff, when in fact, people are 

flogged in front of mosques every day in Saudi Arabia that say 

what we are telling you. 

So in effect, we are actually invoking the same blasphemy laws 

in America that they do in Saudi Arabia. Why? Because of this fear 

of somehow that it is gonna become anti-Islam. Actually, at the end 

of the day, the best answer to your question is one of denial. 

It is like the smokers who don’t want to admit that the cancer, 

lung cancer, is coming from the smoking. The smoking—we are not 

abandoning the whole patient, but the smoking, the habit that is 

dealing to this, is Harakat-e-Islami, is what they call themselves 

in Arabic—Islamic movements. Political movements. 

So they might take away the tactic, and there is this huge letter 

to Baghdadi that all these organizations that are supported by 

ISNA and other Imams. They wrote a 25-page screed about why 

Baghdadi doesn’t have the authority to declare jihad. He doesn’t 

have the authority to declare a caliphate. 

What Americans—and the reason I am bringing your attention 

to it, they said the caliphate is mandatory in that letter. They said 

jihad, violent jihad is mandatory, but he doesn’t have the credence 

or the authority. 

So that is the bigger problem. That is the intoxicant. It is not 

just the violence in these little terror groups that we can defeat 

militarily. It is the root cause. The root cause is this idea that violent jihad, Muslims can do that. Armies should be Muslim by 

name. That the Ummah is a State. It is not just a faith practice. 

Until we Muslims address that, and you bring us and force— 

push us to do this, not by taking away our rights, but by actually 

having an adult conversation, and not by infantilizing our community into saying, oh, we can’t address these things. So you have to 

address it and get us out of the denial that is preventing the treatment of the disease. 

Mr. PERRY. So how do you believe the—I call censoring of certain 

terms when discussing violent Islamist extremists affects the Government’s ability to interact with the Muslim communities in the 

United States? I mean does this practice in in fact make us less 

secure? I think you would agree it does. 

Dr. JASSER. Absolutely. It makes us less secure because then 

what ends up happening is, again, like I said in my opening, the 

arsonists are actually helping us fight fires. We aren’t, I mean, 

92 

Muslim, when I hear them talk about the community, are you 

working with the community or what is the effort? 

The effort is not just Muslims that go to mosque or that are 

parts of these Islamic groups. It is Muslims that are physicians, attorneys, that work in civic organizations and ethnic organizations 

from Indian organizations, Arabic, et cetera—Syrian organizations, 

not just religious groups. 

We are a diverse community. When Homeland Security and others want to reach out, don’t just go to the mosque. I mean, just like 

in the reformation in the West, it was led by the business community and the others that finally told the theocrats that they don’t 

run what defines Christianity. That ultimately led to the American 

Revolution. 

This is where we are in our time in history in Islam. As long as 

we continue to have this bigotry of low expectations where we just 

let the theocrats dominate who defines Islam, which is what the 

avoidance of the term does, then we are going to continue to actually do the bidding of our enemies, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, et 

cetera, and actually not work with our Muslims that share our values of freedom, democracy, and the universal declaration of human 

rights. 

Mr. PERRY. Do you have something to add, Mr. Hoekstra, to—— 

Mr. HOEKSTRA. Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I think it is important to have that discussion, as Zuhdi was pointing out, because 

those of us who have traveled to the Middle East and those types 

of things, we recognize, as should all Americans, the many sacrifices that so many Muslims have paid to help us. 

You know, after the war in Iraq, and you go to the police training 

academies and you speak with the young men who are being 

trained and you recognize that many of these officers ended up 

being killed because they were targeted by radical jihadists. We 

need to celebrate the contributions and the sacrifices that those 

folks made. 

The folks that worked that worked with the American military 

in Iraq, who were targeted as they were working with us and especially targeted when we left Iraq and Afghanistan for being, you 

know, for working with us. They were targeted. We also need to 

recognize that the victims of radical jihadism are primarily other 

Muslims. 

You know, it is awful what radical jihadists do to Christians and 

other religious minorities throughout the Middle East, but the primary target and the groups paying the biggest price are actually 

other Muslims. 

So by moving that total discussion off of the table, you don’t have 

that dialog and discussion about how much other Muslims have 

sacrificed to try to help us and how much they want to get rid of 

the radical jihadist movement. 

Mr. PERRY. Do you want to move on? 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Well, I don’t really like to—I notice that 

you wanted an opportunity to sort-of weigh in on a discussion that 

just taken place. I wanted to present that opportunity to you with 

my time. 

Ms. AZIZ. Thank you. I just have a few points. The first is that 

the Government is prohibited by the First Amendment in entanVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00096 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
93 

gling itself in religion. The establishment clause prohibits the Government from either promoting or infringing on religion and that 

would include engaging in theological debates. It is not the place, 

both as a matter of policy but more importantly as a matter of law 

for the Government to intervene in determining what is correct or 

incorrect in Islam. 

That is just something that has to happen within the communities, within the private sphere. My colleagues here are welcome 

to engage in that debate within the free marketplace of ideas. In 

fact, there are many debates that are going on, at least within the 

American Muslim communities—which are very diverse—about reform. People define reform very differently. 

So I think that it is a bit disingenuous to say that American 

Islam is stagnant, and that there are no debates, that there are no 

healthy discussions. 

The second point is I don’t think we should underestimate the 

open letter to Baghdadi. We are talking about over 700 mainstream 

religious authorities, scholars who are qualified, who have degrees, 

not people who just self-proclaim themselves to be experts or selfproclaim themselves to be reformists. Those individuals across the 

world have said this organization is fringe. 

It is violent. It is terrorist. It doesn’t represent Islam insofar as 

their interpretations of the theology. Like in any theology, there always has been and there always will be groups who are going to 

misappropriate it for their political means. 

I just want to also add with regard to the Middle East, secular 

military dictators are repressing people as much as those who use 

religion as a ruse to oppress people. So for us to think that it is 

one problem, the Muslim Brotherhood, or some particular other organization that claims to use religion for political means, that is 

very simplistic. 

Egypt is a ticking time bomb, and it is going to have another revolution in my opinion, and it is going to be because of poverty, political repression, that is caused by military secular dictatorships. 

Mr. PERRY. Yes, ma’am. 

Dr. Jasser. 

Dr. JASSER. Yes, thank you. I welcome the opportunity to respond to that because this is actually the key issue is that it is a 

cop-out to say that the Government cannot get involved. When you 

have a movement that is a theopolitical movement, it would be like 

in the Cold War saying that we should work with the Italian communists or the Cuban communists when we were fighting the Soviets. 

The Islamist movements are political movements that put into 

law legal systems that believe that Western secular law is un-Islamic, and they divide the world into Dar al-Islam and Dar alHarb, the land of Islam, and the land of war. So if you are wondering how the Omar Mateens and others get radicalized, they are 

simply the tip of the iceberg of movements that view Western liberal democracies as the enemy. 

So our Constitution, and our First Amendment, is not a suicide 

pact. We cannot therefore say, well, if it calls itself a religion, welcome. Give them security clearances, give them whatever they 

want. It doesn’t matter, because it is a religion. 

94 

No, we have to have—and actually our response to the letter to 

Baghdadi was our Muslim reform movement declaration that we 

mailed twice to every mosque in the country, every Islamic organization. 

It is not 25 pages. It is 2 pages. It is in the record. It is an appendix to my testimony. I would ask you to look at it. It is simply 

2 pages. It is not about religious theological debates. 

It says we reject the caliphate, all caliphates. We reject the Islamic State, all Islamic States. We reject violent jihad. We call for 

the equality of men and women, for the freedom of sexual identity, 

for free speech, rejecting blasphemy laws, apostasy laws. 

So therefore, those are not religious issues. Those are American 

principles that are part of the universal declaration of human 

rights. So it is not, no, I don’t want the Government getting into 

theology, but I certainly want them protecting the underpinning 

and foundations of our American democracy that is based in religious freedom. 

So when Raif Badawi, Wahlida Buheir and others in Saudi Arabia are flogged for their religious beliefs, and I agree with Dr. Aziz 

about secular dictators. Both pathways are evil in the Middle East. 

We need to work toward a third pathway. 

But to say that attacking secular dictators and then saying, well, 

Islamist movements are somehow our friends because they believe 

in elections, those are mobocracies. She is right. There will be more 

revolutions in Egypt. I hope so. But we need to be on the right side 

of history. 

The denial to say, well, it is all about food and jobs, and we just 

get social services. No. It is about a political ideology that is rooted 

in Sharia statism. The only counter to that is not countering the 

tactic, but promoting Muslims that believe in national identity like 

Americanism, Egyptianism, a Syrianism that believes in liberty for 

all, equally and not about an Islamic State. That is what CVE 

should become, which is CVI. 

Mr. PERRY. I would also say that while I find the military dictatorships just as unpalatable as the theocratic ones, the military dictatorships, generally speaking, that we might be discussing for purposes of this conversation, aren’t presenting an imminent threat 

within and to our homeland, based on their actions in their country, where the other is. 

That having been said, I want to give Ms. Qudosi a couple of opportunities to answer some questions here. In an article in the Federalist that you authored earlier this year, you drew a comparison 

between World War II and our current struggle against violent Islamic extremism. 

You argued that unlike today, during World War II, the United 

States had no problem clearly defining its enemy. With that, why 

do you believe this administration has been unable or reluctant to 

name violent Islamist extremism as the enemy? 

Ms. QUDOSI. First and foremost, the answer pings off what Dr. 

Aziz said. That is a question of our First Amendment rights. It is 

not just about religion. It is also about free speech, and that has 

been completely squashed. 

There is so much purging, scrubbing. There is cultural shaming, 

social shaming. We are just—excuse me—not allowed to speak 

95 

truthfully without being bashed by the majority Muslim groups. 

That is No. 1. 

So as a larger democracy, we are dealing with a climate that 

doesn’t understand that here is Islam, and then here is how Islam 

started. Then here is how this political ideology that grew out of 

Islam tacked itself on. 

So we are dealing with a hybrid faith here that is part theology, 

part ideology. That means we have to touch political ideology. It is 

not just Islam. It is the ideology that has come out of Islam that 

has mutated the faith. This is something that Muslims simply do 

not even know about, let alone non-Muslims. So that is part of the 

problem. 

Not having understanding of that affects our ability to really be 

able to come up with solutions. So when we say that, you know, 

Islam is peace, or we are not at war with Muslims, well, let’s look 

at what a couple of Muslims have said. 

Excuse me. Earlier this year, I interviewed Abu Taubah, a.k.a. 

Marcus Dwayne Robertson, who was affiliated, or said to be affiliated, with Omar Mateen, the Orlando shooter. In an exclusive 2- 

hour interview, he stoked race wars. He called for militant Muslims. He said women were unfit for office. He called for a radical 

war against the West. That is inevitable in his eyes. 

He is a Muslim convert, a highly-educated former intelligence official in the United States Marine Corps. So this is one example of 

a domestic Muslim. Internationally we have Oriyah Makfuljan a 

Deobandi-Taliban supporter, a media personality, and an Islamist 

in Pakistan, who was seen in 2009 outside Badshahi Mosque 

standing next to Hillary Clinton, then Secretary of State. 

While she is speaking about challenging extremism, and challenging Taliban, here is a Taliban supporter right next to her who 

has been quoted to publicly say that women like to be beaten, the 

West are heartless killers, Jews are apocalyptic destruction. In the 

coming war, he calls for all Muslims to come to arms. 

These are the people that we are dealing with. These are the 

people who are using faith to drive that mission. So we can sit here 

and say we are not going to touch Islam, but what is the alternative here? I mean there is no alternative. We have to touch it. 

The other reason is that we keep saying what will ISIS say? 

Well, ISIS isn’t sitting over there wondering about what Americans 

are going to say. ISIS is going to use whatever narrative we throw 

at them and twist it. If we talk about ISIS being Islamic, they have 

won. If we say ISIS is not Islamic, they have still won because we 

are not addressing what gives them validation. 

That validation comes from the darkest underbelly of a 1,400- 

year-old faith that justified killing. Not to the extremes that they 

have done it in, but still they use the seed of Islamic terror to justify their actions, and launch a caliphate, which was, again, still a 

part of original Islam and part of Islam’s origin story. 

So the best way to tackle ISIS beyond whack-a-mole CVE programs is to tackle their belief system, and to ultimately destroy the 

credibility they hold, which is ultimately that this is a divine mission for them on some level. So we have to understand the theological aspect of it. 

96 

Mr. PERRY. Yes. Could I supplant belief system with ideology? 

Would it be—you say we have to attack their belief system. Would 

it be correct or analogous to use ideology in the same vein? 

Ms. QUDOSI. You could, but if I am gonna be brutally honest, ultimately it comes down to what their identity, or what their identity as Muslims is and what their belief system is about God, or 

Allah. So that is really the root of the problem. 

So that any radicalized person—Omar Mateen, if you want to 

talk about Abu Taubah, you want to talk about ISIS, al-Adnani, 

these people ultimately look for a higher source, and that is how 

they have interpreted God. So this becomes an ideological and a 

theological debate. 

At the same time, what we have here is we have a country that 

doesn’t want to be offensive, who wants to hide itself under political correctness, while throwing billions if not more dollars at a 

problem. How much more money are we gonna throw at this problem and expect it to solve itself? 

Mr. PERRY. The Chair thanks you, gentlelady. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. I have two questions. 

Mr. PERRY. The gentlelady is recognized. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Thank you very much. Ms. Quo—— 

Mr. PERRY. Qudosi. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Qudosi, I am sorry. I can’t see the D 

here. Can I just ask you what is your profession? What do you—— 

Ms. QUDOSI. I am a writer. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. That is—— 

Ms. QUDOSI. Yes. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Are you an author, or do you—— 

Ms. QUDOSI. I am working on 4 books at the moment, 2 of them 

are almost done. I have been blogging with Qudosi Chronicles. I 

have written for numerous outlets. I have traveled overseas, studied communities, Japanese American and—sorry—Japanese Muslim communities. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. That is how you make a living? Is that 

how you make a living? 

Ms. QUDOSI. Yes. I also do marketing, I do marketing specifically 

for behavioral health, mental health, and for education. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Oh, OK, thank you. 

Dr. Jasser, you said something there. You said that the CVE 

needs to change its name to CVI. So then are you suggesting that 

CVE’s only job should be to address counter violent extremism in 

the Islam community? So what would we do, what would its responsibility be in other space? Or do you feel that there is no need 

for any activity in any other space of domestic violence? 

Dr. JASSER. I am glad you want me to clarify that. As far as the 

context of this hearing, which is countering radical Islamism and 

the terror that is invoked from that, I believe that we need a CVI 

program. 

Now that would be part of Department of Homeland Security’s 

other programs to keep us safe from all threats. But this comparison, I think it is very ethno- and National-centric to simply compare radical Islamic groups to other non-Islamic terror threats in 

America. 

97 

Why? Because this is a global war that we are seeing simply 

fought on the streets of America and on the streets of Europe. But 

the bigger problem is the cataclysmic changes happening within 

nations across the Middle East. 

So that is going to reach into the biggest threat to those dictatorships, and those Islamist movements, which is America. It is gonna 

come here whether we are isolationist or not. The way to counter 

that is to work with groups that share our ideals within the Muslim community. 

Josh Earnest from the administration talked about the narrative, 

but his discussion of the narrative was simply a negative, which 

was oh, we need to be apologetic that America isn’t bigoted, et 

cetera. I would tell you we need to promote freedom and democracy 

within the Muslim community, domestically and abroad, so—— 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Thank you. 

Dr. JASSER [continuing]. I think that is important. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. I would like to just kind-of quote you. 

‘‘The only way to right this deep misdirection is actually very simple. All we need to do is to abandon the mantra of countering violent extremism, and replace it with countering violent Islamism.’’ 

Dr. JASSER. Absolutely. So if you are looking at, for example—— 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Thank you. 

Dr. JASSER [continuing]. Extremism that may come from the 

Nazi party, I would tell you it should be countering violence of fascism. So extremism is simply a tactic. 

Mr. PERRY. The gentlelady has yielded her time. Reclaiming my 

time now, if you want to finish your thought, Dr. Jasser, you may. 

Dr. JASSER. Thank you. Again, extremism, the reason we are failing, we are holding our Homeland Security agents to a standard 

that is impossible. It is turning into some truly thought police, 

where they are trying to figure out when an act is gonna happen. 

Acts come from ideas. 

Every time, whether Fort Hood, when he is walking around Walter Reed with cards that said Soldier of Allah. Whether it was 

Omar Mateen, or any of the radicals. The Chattanooga Bomber was 

posting on-line that he wanted to establish Islam on earth. We 

weren’t monitoring that. 

Nobody is saying to take away their rights, but we need to monitor that. That is not extremism, that is Sharia supremacist ideology that we should be monitoring. And right now our Homeland 

Security agents are unable to do that, because of restrictions of verbiage in the lexicon that is blasphemy laws that prevents them 

from doing their work. 

Mr. PERRY. I yield time to the gentlelady. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Thank you. I don’t think we disagree 

that we should be vigilant, and we should be operating in every 

space that represents a threat to the safety and security of the 

United States of America. That is not a premise that I disagree 

with. 

I agree that we should be doing it. I just simply think that we 

should not be targeting our language in such a way that probably 

helps to fuel the recruitment and the expansion of those that we 

are talking about today. With that, I thank you very much. 

Mr. PERRY. Reclaiming my time. 

98 

Dr. Jasser. 

Dr. JASSER. Well, I think it is willful blindness and actually it 

encourages the radicals to see us in the freest country on the planet, refuse to identify it as the problem, the root cause as the Islamic State ideology, any Islamic State ideology. That establishment clause that we are defending here is the exact central nuclear 

idea that the Islamists hate. They want to establish religion not 

only in their countries, but on earth. 

Muslims that reject that, are the ones we should bond with. 

Homeland Security cannot bond with Muslims that want an establishment clause in Muslim countries, unless we identify the disease 

as Islamism domestically and abroad. 

Thus we end up actually with these false partners. Imagine the 

Cold War working with communist parties to help us against the 

Soviets because they rejected Soviet global theory, but yet they believed in communism. 

That is what we are doing right now when we work with the Islamic State ideologues of Saudi Arabia, Iran, and others as our 

partners against radical militant Islamists, and call them, as Mr. 

Ellison did earlier, a cult, et cetera. 

These are natural violent byproducts of Islamist nations that is 

spread by billions. Books are in organizations and mosques like the 

Islamic Society of North America mosques and others, books like 

the ‘‘Reliance of the Traveler’’ that call for the death of apostates 

and others, still are sold in their conventions that Jeh Johnston 

speaks at. That is a problem of willful blindness. 

Mr. PERRY. Thank you, Dr. Jasser. 

Ms. Aziz, you have argued that the recent rise in radicalism and 

terrorism can be attributed to factors such as political oppression 

and lack of economic opportunities in countries. I don’t want to put 

words in your mouth, but that is what I have got here. 

So if that is not true, please forgive me and just let me know. 

But if it is true, do you have any empirical data to support that 

claim? 

Ms. AZIZ. Well, there are many studies by international development experts that focus on failed states. In fact, there are many— 

the literature is growing about what is happening in the Middle 

East in terms of the causes for all of these deaths that we see that 

are caused by terrorism. 

So there is no shortage. It is certainly a debate within the literature. But there is no shortage of opinion that the terrorism is 

bred when you have failed states, when you have conflict. 

Mr. PERRY. Well, so, and I imagine, I just wonder if there is a 

causal relationship. I am not saying that it doesn’t happen in failed 

states where there is increased poverty and lack of opportunity, et 

cetera. But we have it happening in the United States. We have 

it happening in the most affluent countries on the planet. 

We have it happening and being led by, or having been led by, 

some of the most affluent people on the planet in Osama bin 

Laden, al-Zawahiri. These are educated people of means, yet they 

ascribe to this ideology. 

So when we hear that some of the roots are political oppression 

and lack of economic opportunity, I got to tell you, I find especially 

the political oppression, well, either one. I mean the political opVerDate Mar 15 2010 07:11 Jul 10, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00102 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 H:\114THCONGRESS\16OM0922\16OM0922.TXT HEATH
99 

pression. These folks are oppressed because they wish to overthrow 

the governments that they are in. 

Now, the governments they are in might be autocratic, but they 

just wish to institute a theocratic government that is at least as 

oppressive as the one that they just replaced. From the economic 

standpoint these, again, are people of means. So how do we validate that other than just saying it happens at the same place? But 

I don’t see a cause and effect, and that is what I am looking for 

as some empirical data, if you have any. 

Ms. AZIZ. So I think you have to look at the leaders versus the 

recruits, versus the opportunity. Leaders of most politically motivated groups that use an ideology, whether it is religious or secular 

in nature, are often actually quite sophisticated. That is why they 

are not on the front lines and they are very few in number. What 

the failed state and the conflicts and the repression create is fertile 

ground for recruitment. 

So it makes it very easy to manipulate particularly young people, 

often young men who may have mental health problems, who may 

be experiencing a personal crisis, who may in fact be poor, alienated, and marginalized, to essentially manipulate them and lie to 

them, and say this ideology—if it is religious it is often completely 

warped—is a justification for you to join me. 

Then when you have a failed state there is no state to control 

that, there is no police force, there is no intelligence. But I just 

want to note that in Syria, over 100,000 Syrians have died from 

state terrorism from Assad’s regime. 

So non-state terrorism—if we didn’t have the conflict in Syria 

and Iraq right now, we would not nearly be seeing these numbers 

in terms of victims of terrorism, which as my colleague said, most 

of whom, over 90 percent are Muslims. 

Mr. PERRY. Which to some extent I would agree with you, and 

I would refer back to PSD–11 and a change in policy where the 

United States essentially partnered with the Muslim Brotherhood, 

and people that are interested in a theocratic state. We have created or been a party to creating this issue in Northern Africa and 

the Middle East. 

It has been a fascinating, enlightening discussion, and I appreciate your patience and your diligence, both the testifiers and the 

audience and the Members. Today the Chair thanks very much the 

witnesses, especially those who have traveled long distances for 

their valuable testimony, and the Members for their questions. 

Members may have some additional questions. If I may depart 

just from the text for a moment? Dr. Jasser, you said there was a 

25-page—what did you—— 

Dr. JASSER. Two-page letter. 

Mr. PERRY. No, he had the 2-page letter that has already been 

submitted. The 25-page—— 

Dr. JASSER. The letter to Baghdadi that actually my colleague 

endorsed. So—— 

Mr. PERRY. Has that been entered into the record? 

Dr. JASSER. No, I didn’t—— 

Mr. PERRY. Could you forward that to me please, at your earliest 

convenience? 

Dr. JASSER. Yes, sir. 

100 

Mr. PERRY. I appreciate it. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. What is the 25-page supposed to be? 

Mr. PERRY. The 25-page, to be correct, right? 

Dr. JASSER. The 2-page is part of the appendix. My appendices 

of my testimony has the Muslim Declaration. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. We didn’t get either. 

Mr. PERRY. OK, we will make sure you do. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Yes. 

Mr. PERRY. But he is talking about the 25-page letter to 

Baghdadi. 

Dr. JASSER. Yes, that I didn’t—— 

Mr. PERRY. That is the one I want to see as well. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. OK. 

Mr. PERRY. He has already submitted the 2-page with his testimony. We will make sure you get it. 

Ms. WATSON COLEMAN. Right. 

Mr. PERRY. Yes, ma’am. All right. 

So with that, Members may have some additional questions for 

the witnesses, and we will ask you to respond to these in writing. 

Pursuant to committee rule 7(e), the hearing record rule, will remain open for 10 days. Without objection, the subcommittee stands 

adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:49 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

(101) 

A P P E N D I X 

QUESTIONS FROM HONORABLE BARRY LOUDERMILK FOR GEORGE SELIM

Question 1. Could you provide the committee with the CVE curriculum that your 

office is developing for the partners it is currently engaging with? If so, please provide it in an addendum to your response. If not, please explain why it cannot be 

shared with the committee. 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

Question 2a. Once an organization is in the review process to receive a grant, are 

these organizations vetted for security issues? If so, what type of screening criteria 

is in place to vet applicants? 

Who, specifically, within DHS is doing the vetting? 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

Question 2b. Does DHS have standing agreements with other agencies to assist 

in the vetting process? If so, who are they and how are they vetting applicants? If 

not, why? 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

Question 2c. Who exactly is vetted? The organization, or individuals within the 

organization? If only the organization as a whole is vetted, and not individuals that 

comprise the organization, are we not opening ourselves up to a large security gap? 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

Question 2d. Is every single received application vetted? Or does the vetting start 

after an applicant has successfully moved past an initial review stage? 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

Question 2e. Considering the grants are being awarded to counter radical Islam, 

do you think the current vetting process is robust enough? What more could or 

should be done? Please explain. 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

Question 3a. As mentioned in Chairman Perry’s opening statement, properly defining the threat that we currently face is of the utmost importance. However, the 

administration refuses to use terminology such as ‘‘Islamist’’ when discussing extremism. 

What terminology does the Office of Community Partnerships use to define this 

terrorism? 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

Question 3b. If the Office of Community Partnerships chooses to not correctly or 

adequately define our enemy, how are you able to fully advertise the CVE Grant 

Program? Do you think you would receive a different set of applicants based on how 

you’re viewing, or not viewing radical extremism? 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

Question 3c. What type of guidance or language in the grant application forms 

specifically discusses the ideology of radical Islam? 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

102 

Question 3d. By not including proper background information on the threat—for 

example the root causes of radicalization, and specific language to frame the 

Islamist threat, do you think you are ignoring the intent that Congress had when 

authorizing and appropriating these funds? 

Answer. Response was not received at the time of publication. 

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