The governor of the US state of Florida, Ron DeSantis, on Monday designated Muslim advocacy group Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the Muslim Brotherhood foreign terrorist organisations.
The move comes after Texas Governor Greg Abbott last month designated the CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood as foreign terrorist and transnational criminal organisations. Since then, US President Donald Trump has also issued an executive order directing agencies to initiate the formal process for designating certain chapters of the Muslim Brotherhood as terrorist organisations.
According to Fox News, Florida’s designation of the CAIR is at the state level. It doesn’t carry the legal force of a federal foreign terrorist organisation listing, which only the US State Department can issue.
In a post on X, the Florida governor said, “Florida is designating the Muslim Brotherhood and the CAIR as foreign terrorist organisations.
“Florida agencies are hereby directed to undertake all lawful measures to prevent unlawful activities by these organisations, including denying privileges or resources to anyone providing material support,” he said in the post, which also shared images of the governor’s executive order.
In response, the CAIR and its Florida chapter announced that a lawsuit would be filed against DeSantis in response to his “defamatory and unconstitutional” order.
“From the moment Ron DeSantis took office as Florida governor, he has prioritized serving the Israeli government over serving the people of Florida,” the joint statement said.
“Like Greg Abbott in Texas, Ron DeSantis is an Israel-first politician who wants to smear and silence Americans, especially American Muslims, critical of US support for Israel’s war crimes,” it said.
“We look forward to defeating Governor DeSantis’ latest Israel-first stunt in a court of law, where facts matter and conspiracy theories have no weight. In the meantime, we encourage all Floridians and all Americans to speak up against this latest attempt to shred the Constitution for the benefit of a foreign government,” the statement added.