The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), an organization which promotes itself as “the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization,” or in the words of its national communications director Ibrahim Hooper, as “similar to a Muslim NAACP,” issued a press release today calling on Texas Senator and Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz to oust Kevin Kookogey, his campaign’s state chairman for Tennessee, “because of his longstanding support for anti-Muslim and Islamophobic causes.”
The release quotes CAIR’s Government Affairs Manager Robert McCaw who alleges that "If Senator Cruz chooses to keep Mr. Kookogey on his campaign staff, it would serve as an endorsement of anti-Muslim hate."
McCaw also issues a warning to Cruz that, so far as CAIR is concerned, he too is skating on thin ice:
In the past few months, Senator Cruz has attended several conferences featuring notorious Islamophobes like Robert Spencer and Frank Gaffney. Despite calls to distance himself from such anti-Muslim bigots, it seems that Senator Cruz is only drawing closer to hate-mongers.
Speaking to the specific reasons why Kookogey should be considered an Islamophobe and removed from the Cruz campaign, McCaw cites that:
in 2012 - as chairman of the Williamson County Republican Party - Kookogey oversaw the adoption of a resolution condemning Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam for appointing a Muslim lawyer to the state's Department of Economic and Community Development.
The resolution stated in part:
"Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam has elevated and/or afford preferential political status to Sharia adherents in Tennessee, thereby aiding and abetting the advancement of an ideology and doctrine which is wholly incompatible with the Constitution of the United States and the Tennessee Constitution."
Governor Haslam’s office denied those charges at the time, stating in a letter written by his then-deputy Claude Ramsey that “There is no effort by the Haslam administration, the State of Tennessee, or any agency or department of the State to promote or advance Shariah law or Shariah compliant finance.”
CAIR’s McCaw also cites the fact that in 2011, the Williamson County Republican Party, under Kookogey’s leadership, “hosted a luncheon to honor infamous Dutch Islamophobe and far-right politician Geert Wilders.”
As an organization that has faced repeated attacks and questioning due to its close association with individuals and organizations promoting Islamic terrorism, CAIR may want to rethink its strategy of targeting Republicans for their “Islamophobic” connections.
