Trump Takes Aim at the Muslim Brotherhood

Although the Muslim Brotherhood is a global organizations, which includes inside America, this specific order addresses chapters in Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt engaged in or facilitating and supporting violence and destabilization campaigns that harm their own regions, United States citizens, and United States interests.

However, the exact wording of the Whitehouse statement leaves it open to perhaps include domestic chapters in the future: “…any Muslim Brotherhood chapters or other subdivisions, including those in Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt, as foreign terrorist organizations.”

The main focus is to cut off the funding networks which support terrorism.

Jordan, a key ally of the US, and sharing a peace treaty with their neighbor Israel, has long suffered from attacks, violence and instability caused by the Muslim Brotherhood. Trump’s decree is in response to Muslim Brotherhood leaders in Jordan providing funding to Hamas and the Lebanese branch of the group, known as al-Jamaa al-Islamiya, and siding with Hamas and Hezbollah in their war with Israel.

An Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood leader is accused of calling for violent attacks against the US and their allies and interests during the Israeli war on Gaza.

“President Trump is confronting the Muslim Brotherhood’s transnational network, which fuels terrorism and destabilization campaigns against US interests and allies in the Middle East,” the White House said.

Besides making it illegal to provide material support to the group, it would also ban current and former members from entering the US, and enable economic sanctions to cut-off their financial networks.

The Muslim Brotherhood has branches across the Middle East disguised as political parties and social organizations.

Muslim American groups or individual activists may find themselves under scrutiny after this decree on allegations of ties to the Muslim Brotherhood or contributions to charities affiliated with the group.

There have been numerous trials and accusations in the US concerning Islamic organizations accused of ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.

Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott designated both the Muslim Brotherhood and CAIR as “foreign terrorist organizations and transnational criminal organizations”.

CAIR is the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which has been linked in legal investigations to the Muslim Brotherhood.

As of 2012, the city of Houston has the largest Muslim population in Texas and the largest Muslim population in the Southern United States.

Texas Senator Ted Cruz, Republican, had introduced previous legislation four times in an attempt to outlaw the Muslim Brotherhood. In July, he introduced the current bill S.2293, the Muslim Brotherhood Terrorist Designation Act of 2025, in the 119th Congress (2025-2026). It was read twice and referred to the Foreign Relations Committee in the Senate.

Senator Ashley Moody joined Cruz to introduce the act and said, “The Muslim Brotherhood Terrorist Designation Act is common sense legislation that will declare the Muslim Brotherhood, a group known to seek widespread hate against Christians, Jews and other religious groups, a foreign terrorist organization.”

Senator Ted Cruz said, “The Muslim Brotherhood is a terrorist organization, and it provides support to Muslim Brotherhood branches that are terrorist organizations. One of those branches is Hamas, American allies in the Middle East and Europe have already labeled the Brotherhood a terrorist organization, and the United States should do the same, and do so expeditiously.”

Representative Díaz-Balart said, “Today, I once again introduced legislation to designate the Muslim Brotherhood as a foreign terrorist organization.”

The Cruz bill is supported by FDD Action, Christians United for Israel Action Fund, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), and the Republican Jewish Coalition.

Senator Rick Scott said, “The Muslim Brotherhood is a radical Islamist network with deep ties to extremist organizations like Hamas and the states that support them, like Qatar and Turkey.”

In 2008, the Hudson Institute, a research organization promoting American leadership for a secure, free, and prosperous future, wrote about the Muslim Brotherhood in the US, “Although various Islamist groups do quarrel over tactics and often bear considerable animosity towards one another, they all agree on the endgame: a world dictated by political Islam.”

Many Americans, including those in government, may not be aware that Islamists are opposed to secular governance. They believe that Islamic rules and laws based upon the Quran and the sharia code must dictate all aspects of human society.

In 2018, the Clarion Project wrote about Ghassan Elashi, the CEO of the Holy Land Foundation. Elashi was sentenced to 65 years in prison in 2009 for funneling 12 million dollars to Hamas. The North American Islamic Trust (NAIT), a Muslim Brotherhood entity that funds mosques in America, was named as unindicted co-conspirator in the scheme.

In a suburb of Detroit, the Islamic Cultural Association (ICA) is affiliated with a number of Muslim Brotherhood groups. In the course of the investigation, it was reported that ICA had direct ties to the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) also named as anMuslim unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land terror financing case alongside NAIT.

Asim Khan served as the New Jersey chapter president for the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA), another Muslim Brotherhood-linked group that promotes worldwide Islamic domination and anti-Semitism. ICNA was identified as a Muslim Brotherhood entity from evidence presented at the Holy Land trial.

Qatar has a long-standing, complex relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood, Qatar has been a strong supporter of the Brotherhood, providing a refuge, financial support, and a platform for its ideas, which has led to international political tension with countries like Saudi Arabia and the UAE that officially designate the Brotherhood as a terrorist group.

Turkey is a major hub for Islamist movements, with the ruling AK Party maintaining close ties with the broader Muslim Brotherhood network, especially with Qatar as a state backer. This relationship includes supporting groups like Hamas and fostering a “pro-Muslim Brotherhood” stance as part of its foreign policy, while also creating regional isolation and internal friction.

The Arab Spring Ruse: How the Muslim Brotherhood Duped Washington in Libya and Syria by US political writer and counter-terrorism expert John Rossomando exposed the relationship between US President Barack Obama and the Muslim Brotherhood.

“Few had realised how dramatically the Obama administration had altered official US government policy towards the Muslim Brotherhood until the moment US-backed Muslim Brotherhood parties made grabs for power in Egypt, Libya and Syria,” Rossomando wrote.

The book detailed the Obama administration’s changes and showed how it assisted in grabbing power in Egypt, Libya and Syria.

Countries that have labeled and outlawed the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization include Austria, Russia, Bahrain, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and United Arab Emirates.

While some view the Trump decree as focused on foreign groups, many like Cruz and Abbot will see the domestic threat posed by a global organization with huge financial resources operating freely in plain view across the US. While Islam, the religion, is compatible with American values, the brand of political Islam adhered to among Muslim Brotherhood devotees is not. Democracy is not compatible with the Muslim Brotherhood platform.

Steven Sahiounie is a two-time award-winning journalist.