Keith Ellison sends reply to Bachmann; uses Republicans to make argument

Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN), the first Muslim elected to U.S. Congress, has taken great offense at a series of letters sent to the Inspectors General of various Departments and Agencies demanding answers about Muslim Brotherhood influence in the halls of U.S. power.

Ellison has now sent a letter of his own to Reps. Michele Bachmann (R-MN), Louie Gohmert (R-TX), Trent Franks (R-AZ), Thomas Rooney (R-FL), and Lynn Westmoreland (R-GA). The letter demands that Bachmann and her fellow congressmen reveal their sources and the evidence of their claims. One of those claims is that Hillary Clinton's Deputy Chief of Staff Huma Abedin, has familial ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.

You can read more about the case against Huma Abedin and Hillary here but it's also important to focus on the strategy Ellison is employing in his attack against Bachmann; he cites Republican Party officials who have been identified as being problematic in the fight against Islamic fundamentalism.

Ellison's letter, via Think Progress, states:

As evidence for these allegations, you reference MuslimBrotherhoodinAmerica.com, a Web site created by Frank Gaffney of the Center for Security Policy (CSP).

Mr. Gaffney has a long history of making unsubstantiated anti-Muslim allegations, including:

• Accusing then-ISAF Commander General David Petraeus of “submission” to Islamic law because he condemned Florida pastor Terry Jones’ burning of a Quran;

• Accusing presidential candidate Herman Cain after meeting with ISNA of meeting with “the largest Muslim Brotherhood front in the United States” (language that appears verbatim in your letters);

• Accusing New Jersey Governor Chris Christie of “corruption” and “treason” for appointing a Muslim lawyer to be a judge;

• Accusing anti-tax advocate Grover Norquist of “enabling and empowering Muslim Brotherhood influence operations against our movement and our country”;

• Accusing former Bush Administration official Suhail Khan of conducting a “Muslim Brotherhood Influence Operation” against the American Conservative Union (ACU), the host of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), and

• Accusing Republican Virginia House of Delegates member David Ramadan of waging “stealth jihad” by seeking elected office.

The sad truth is that Ellison is right about Gaffney's claims, which is an indictment of the people whom Gaffney identifies. Starting at the beginning... In a 1991 Muslim Brotherhood document penned by Mohamed Akram, The Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) was identified as a Muslim Brotherhood organization.

That document said, in part:

The Ikhwan (Muslim Brotherhood) must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and "sabotaging" its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God's religion is made victorious over all other religions.

Ok, so instead of Ellison pointing to Herman Cain's visit with the head of the ISNA - Mohamed Magid - in 2011 as a refutation of Bachmann's concerns, Americans should be questioning Cain's decision to do so.

Of course, let's not forget Chris Christie's bombastic response to a legitimate question about why he appointed a Muslim with questionable ties to a county judgeship. His defense of Sohail Mohammed is definitely suspect.

Then, of course, there is the Grover Norquist / Suhail Khan dynamic. Here is video courtesy of Jay Mark Campbell from CPAC 2011. Note the absurd claim by Khan, whose father was an early founder of both ISNA and another Muslim Brotherhood group - the Muslim Students Association (MSA), that there is "no Muslim Brotherhood in the United States." Take note at the 2:45 mark, where Khan doesn't just lie but he pretends that the lifework of his father doesn't exist.

Isn't that a bit disrespectful?

Khan and Grover Norquist go way back. Conservatives who tend to blindly support the Republican Party as the best of two options should be extremely wary. In much the same way that the Democratic Party was infiltrated, there are forces at work that seek to do the same with the Republican Party, whether wittingly or unwittingly. By using the argument that he does, Ellison seems to be banking on those who blindly support the Republican Party.