11/20/25 Reposted from thehill.com
The Council on American-Islamic Relations’s (CAIR) legal arm has filed a lawsuit challenging Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s (R) designation of their group as a “foreign terrorist organization” — a stance at odds with the U.S. government.
CAIR is the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights advocacy organization, according to a description on its website. The organization’s legal defense fund and the Muslim Legal Fund of America, a legal advocacy group for Muslims, sued both Abbott and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) on Thursday to prevent the enforcement of Abbott’s designation.
“CAIR Legal Defense Fund has successfully sued and defeated Texas Governor Greg Abbott the last three times he tried to violate the First Amendment by punishing critics of the Israeli government,” Lena Masri, litigation director and general counsel at Cair, said in a statement accompanying the organization’s press release announcing the lawsuit. CAIR and its various chapters have been vocal critics of Israel’s war in Gaza.
“The lawsuit we have filed today is our first step towards defeating Governor Abbott again so that our nation protects free speech and due process for all Americans,” Masri continued.
Abbott’s proclamation, which he signed Tuesday, designated both CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood as foreign terrorist organizations and transnational criminal organizations.
The State Department does not classify either the Muslim Brotherhood or CAIR as a foreign terrorist organization — an official classification designated by the secretary of State. It’s unclear how Abbott will enforce his designations against CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood.
According to a press release from Abbott’s office, his proclamation prevents both CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood from “purchasing or acquiring land in Texas.” CAIR’s lawsuit argues that the enforcement of the proclamation would create “an imminent risk of harm.”
“The idea that Governor Abbott’s going to claim that CAIR — an American Muslim civil rights group — is somehow a foreign terrorist group, it’s patently ludicrous,” Edward Ahmed Mitchell, CAIR’s national deputy director, said at a virtual press conference Thursday. “And it’s the clearest example of bigotry that you call a Muslim that you disagree with a terrorist.”
