The American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona along with several Muslim community leaders wrote a letter Wednesday to Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery to protest a training session purporting to tell the truth about Muslim terrorist groups.
The event, sponsored by Montgomery’s office, is scheduled next week.
The session, titled “Understanding the Threat,” is to be presented by a disgraced former FBI agent named John Guandolo, who focuses on the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas and their supposed infiltration into the United States.
“He’s got a hateful message,” said Dan Pochoda, legal director of the ACLU of Arizona. “It’s so symbolically wrong because it’s a message of hate and racism.”
But Montgomery countered by saying, “It’s apparent to me that the training is mischaracterized.”
Montgomery said he had heard of the program and had sent employees to see it and determine if it was appropriate for law-enforcement officials in Arizona.
“I’m comfortable with the training they’re going to get,” he said.
Montgomery also said he had already talked to local Muslim groups about the training session.
But the session has been canceled in other parts of the country, including Kansas, after strong protest, particularly by Muslim groups.
The organization, Understanding the Threat, says in its mission statement that it “provides threat-focused strategic and operational consultation, training and education for federal, state and local leadership and agencies in government, the private sector and for private citizens.”
Its main premise is that the Muslim Brotherhood wants to “overthrow the United States of America and reduce the American people under the tyranny of Islamic law.”
Its founder, Guandolo, made headlines in 2009 when he resigned from the FBI after it was revealed that he had an affair with a confidential source in a political-corruption case he was investigating.
The Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate groups, describes Guandolo as a “former FBI agent who has made a living calling out high-ranking government officials as secret plants working for the Muslim Brotherhood.”
Guandolo could not be reached for comment immediately.
The training event is scheduled for Sept. 19 at a Hilton Hotel in Tempe.
“Topics to be covered include the threats posed to our local communities by Hamas, Hezbollah and Sharia Law,” according to the invitation sent out by the County Attorney’s Office.
The letter of protest, authored by Pochoda and signed by six Muslim community leaders, said, “The use of anti-Muslim trainers and materials is highly offensive, disparages the faith of millions of Americans, and inevitably leads to biased policing that targets individuals and communities based on religion and ethnicity, and not on criminal acts or evidence of wrongdoing.”
Imraan Siddiqi, president of the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Arizona, called Guandolo an “Islamophobe.”
“There’s no problem with doing anti-terrorism training, but this individual has a bias,” Siddiqi said. “He’s creating a false correlation between being a Muslim and being prone to violence. If you were to say that about any other religious group, it would be unacceptable.”