Lawmakers Condemn Michele Bachmann’s Claim of an Islamist Plot

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/18/lawmakers-condemn-michele-bachmann-s-claim-of-an-islamist-plot/

By ASHLEY SOUTHALL

Representative Michele Bachmann’s recent claim that Islamists have infiltrated the highest levels of the federal government drew strong condemnation on Wednesday from her colleagues in Congress.

A handful of Republican lawmakers led by Ms. Bachmann of Minnesota sent letters on June 13 to five federal agencies demanding investigations of a conspiracy to influence American foreign policy to favor the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist causes.

A letter to the State Department singled out Huma Abedin, a longtime aide to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, prompting an impassioned defense on the Senate floor on Wednesday from Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona.

“These sinister accusations rest solely on a few unspecified and unsubstantiated associations of members of Huma’s family, none of which have been shown to harm or threaten the United States in any way,” Mr. McCain said. “These attacks have no logic, no basis, and no merit and they need to stop. They need to stop now.”

Citing a report by Frank J. Gaffney Jr., the president of the Center for Security Policy, a conservative policy group based in Washington, the lawmakers said Ms. Abedin’s mother, brother and late father had connections to the Muslim Brotherhood, an international Islamist movement whose members recently gained power in Egypt.

“Her position affords her routine access to the Secretary and to policy-making,” the lawmakers wrote in the letter, before listing several instances where the State Department and Mrs. Clinton took actions “that have been enormously favorable to the Muslim Brotherhood and its interests.”

“We believe these actions and policies are deeply problematic,” the lawmakers wrote. “They may even pose security risks for this nation, its people and its interests.”

Ms. Abedin, 37, was born in Michigan and began working for Mrs. Clinton in 1996 when she was first lady. She stayed by Mrs. Clinton’s side in the Senate and during her 2008 run for the Democratic presidential nomination, and is now her deputy chief of staff. A Muslim, she is married to former Representative Anthony Weiner, who is Jewish. Mr. Weiner resigned from Congress last year after he admitted to sending inappropriate photos of himself to women on Twitter. The couple have a 6-month-old son, Jordan.

Mr. McCain said he had known Ms. Abedin for more than a decade and considers her a friend.

“Put simply, Huma represents what is best about America,” he said.

The accusations, he added later, were an affront to all Americans. “When anyone, not least a member of Congress, launches specious and degrading attacks against fellow Americans on the basis of nothing more than fear of who they are and ignorance of what they stand for, it defames the spirit of our nation, and we all grow poorer because of it.”

The lawmakers sent similar letters based on the policy group’s report to the inspectors general in the departments of Defense, Homeland Security, and Justice, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. The letters were also signed by Representatives Trent Franks of Arizona, Louie Gohmert of Texas, Tom Rooney of Florida and Lynn Westmoreland of Georgia.

Representative Keith Ellison, a Minnesota Democrat and a Muslim, requested evidence from Ms. Bachmann to back her claim. Her response, he wrote in a letter to Ms. Bachmann, “simply rehashes claims that have existed for years on anti-Muslim websites and contains no reliable information that the Muslim Brotherhood has infiltrated the U.S. government.”

Ms. Bachmann responded Wednesday afternoon saying that the letters were “unfortunately being distorted.”

“The intention of the letters was to outline the serious national security concerns I had and ask for answers to questions regarding the Muslim Brotherhood and other radical group’s access to top Obama administration officials.”

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