Presidential candidate Cruz appoints Islam critics as advisers

[Eugene]

Source: Reuters

Politics | Thu Mar 17, 2016 6:47pm EDT

Presidential candidate Cruz appoints Islam critics as advisers

NEW YORK | BY JONATHAN ALLEN

Ted Cruz, Donald Trump's closest rival in the Republican race for the White House, named his national security advisers on Thursday, including former staffers of President Ronald Reagan and members of a think tank that has been called an anti-Muslim "hate group" by a civil rights organization.

Announcing the team in a statement, Cruz said he would reverse what he described as the weakening of the United States in a dangerous world, singling out militant Islamist groups in the Middle East and North Africa as his focus.

Among the most recognizable names on the senator's list of 23 advisers was Elliott Abrams, who served in the administrations of both Reagan and President George W. Bush and is a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

But the list of advisers drew more attention for its inclusion of several critics of Muslims. Among those were Frank Gaffney, a former official in the Reagan administration, and at least two other members of a think tank Gaffney founded, the Center for Security Policy.

The center's reports argue that hundreds of thousands of American Muslims support Islamist violence in the United States and that there is a conspiracy to erode the U.S. legal system by elevating sharia, the Islamic legal code.

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Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-idUSKCN0WJ2IX

[pampango]

1. Frank Gaffney is “one of America’s most notorious Islamophobes.”

Gaffney, who served in the Reagan-era Defense Department, now heads the Center for Security Policy. It’s a think tank of sorts well known for promoting conspiratorial theories about the Muslim Brotherhood infiltrating the U.S. government at high levels and the Sharia system replacing American democracy.

Well aware that he is not the GOP establishment’s favorite, Cruz has been urging primary voters to see him as the most likely candidate to beat Trump. But it’s not clear that the Texas senator offers much of an alternative to Trump’s offensive rhetoric.

A few years ago, it looked as though the Republican Party was ready to sever ties with Gaffney and his inflammatory claims. He was banned from the annual Conservative Political Action Conference in 2011 after accusing Norquist and Khan of ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.

But since then, Gaffney has staged a comeback. GOP presidential hopefuls Cruz, Trump, Carly Fiorina, Ben Carson, Rick Santorum and Mike Huckabee all appeared at his group’s events last year. Months ago, Cruz offered the following praise for the zealot: “Frank is a patriot, he loves this country, and he’s clear-eyed about radical Islamic terrorism.”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/ted-cruz-frank-gaffney-islamophobia_us_56eb11cbe4b03a640a69fc3b