The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today released an analysis of the fearmongering led by Texas Governor Greg Abbott and anti-Muslim campaigner Amy Mek around a Muslim-led development project, EPIC City. The analysis places the attack in the context of both a continuing tradition of Texas political figures engaging in anti-Muslim actions and a broader national pattern of fearmongering around Muslim-led development projects.

SEE: EPIC Hate in Texas

The former pattern continued over the weekend when Texas Senator Ted Cruz questioned New York Governor Hochul’s decision to respect the family and faith of a Muslim New York Police Department officer who was recently murdered while responding to a mass shooting.

SEE: UPDATE Hochul Fires Back at Ted Cruz’s Diss Over Head Attire at Fallen Bronx NYPD Det. First Grade Didarul Islam’s Funeral

“You don’t build a stronger Texas by excluding people who lead in medicine, provide charitable aid to their neighbors, and drive innovation,” said CAIR Research and Advocacy Director Corey Saylor. “Governor Abbott wants to benefit from the quality humanitarian, medical, and other public services Muslim provide while demonizing them for political gain.”

The analysis compares what happened in Texas to similar fear-based campaigns targeting Muslims in Tennessee and Michigan.

Saylor added, “In Tennessee and Michigan, despite the fearmongering of anti-Muslim bigots, the Constitution remains the law of the land and America’s time-honored tradition of allowing an individual to live by their faith within the confines of U.S. law remains the norm.”

Among other content in the analysis, CAIR’s researchers found:

• Texas Governor Abbott reshared hateful content from at least two anti-Muslim social media accounts. While he deleted the first, originally authored by anti-Muslim campaigner Amy Mek, the second remained on his account at the time this analysis was published. The second post says, “Islam is a militant ideology cloaked in religious rhetoric, with a clear mandate to destroy the west.”
• Mek claims there are already “Sharia-adherent lifestyle zone(s)” in Texas, in part because of park signs in some neighborhoods “with Islamic behavioral rules like ‘no alcohol’ and ‘no loud music.’ According to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department’s official rules of conduct in parks, it is prohibited to consume, display, or sell alcohol in Texas State parks. The department says it is also an offense to “create a disturbance capable of negatively affecting other park users by causing excessive noise by any means.”

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CONTACT: CAIR Research and Advocacy Director Corey Saylor, 202-384-8857, csaylor@cair.com; CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell, 404-285-9530, e-Mitchell@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202-744-7726, ihooper@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Manager Ismail Allison, 202-770-6280, iallison@cair.com