PHILADELPHIA – May 20, 2024 – Maryland Governor Wes Moore (D) signed a bill on May 16 to oust the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) from a state board that monitors hate crimes. That decision, following unanimous approval by the Maryland General Assembly, followed months of meetings, drafting, and advocacy by the Middle East Forum’s campaign arm (MEF Action).
CAIR’s Maryland director, Zainab Chaudry, posted multiple antisemitic comments to social media in the aftermath of the Oct. 7 atrocity, when Hamas slaughtered 1,200 people in Israel, including 32 Americans, and abducted relatives of Maryland residents. She compared Israel to Nazi Germany and repeated Hamas media claims that Israeli Jews were harvesting the organs of dead Palestinians.
Soon after, Maryland’s Attorney General Anthony Brown (D) temporarily suspended Chaudry from the state’s Commission on Hate Crimes Response and Prevention, on the grounds that her statements “risk disrupting the work and mission of the Commission.” Brown then had to reinstate Chaudry two weeks later, explaining that he lacked the legal authority to suspend her.
Brown’s reversal decision prompted Maryland lawmakers to introduce House Bill 763, at which point MEF Action got engaged. It met with the bill’s author, Delegate Dalya Attar (D-Baltimore City), distributed a dossier on CAIR-Maryland to key legislators, and engaged in other efforts to pass the legislation. MEF showed that Chaudry’s views reflect those of CAIR as a whole; for example, CAIR’s executive director, Nihad Awad, stated in November that he was “happy to see” Israel’s border infiltrated on Oct. 7. Therefore, we argued, replacing Chaudry with another CAIR employee would produce similarly unacceptable results.
During hearings before Maryland’s House Judiciary Committee and Senate Committee on Judicial Proceedings, MEF Action provided witness testimony in support of HB 763 and arranged for local constituents to offer their own testimonies. Among others, Zainab Al-Suwaij, the co-founder of the American Islamic Congress, recounted her experience attending a CAIR event where “speakers expressed radical views, promoting hate speech against other faiths, blaming America, and falsely implicating Jews in 9/11.”
Following Gov. Moore’s signature, CAIR will forfeit its seat in the Commission on Hate Crimes on June 1. MEF plans to work with the attorney general and Maryland Muslims to find a suitable replacement that reflects the values and needs of their community.
“MEF will continue to dismantle government partnerships with dangerous Islamist groups wherever they occur,” said MEF Action Director Benjamin Baird. “CAIR and other pro-Hamas institutions are speaking more candidly since Oct. 7, and we plan to hold them accountable for that.”
The Middle East Forum, a non-profit organization, promotes American interests in the Middle East and protects Western civilization from Islamism. It does so through a combination of original ideas, focused activism, and funding allies. For more information, visit www.meforum.org.
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For more information, contact:
Gregg Roman
roman@meforum.org
+1 (215) 546 5406
