[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 26 (Thursday, February 16, 2012)]
[House]
[Pages H897-H900]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            WAKE UP, AMERICA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Bucshon). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 5, 2011, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert) is 
recognized for 30 minutes.
  Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. These are interesting days in 
which we live. There is supposed to be an old Chinese curse that says: 
May you live in interesting times; and it's as if that curse has been 
placed on us. We certainly live in interesting times.
  On 9/11/2001, this country suffered the worst attack in its history 
on its homeland. It was worse than December 7, 1941. It left thousands 
dead, it left the Nation reeling from the feeling of vulnerability, and 
it pushed the Federal Government to respond quickly.
  Now, there are a number of things that could be effectuated more 
effectively in Iraq and Afghanistan. That would be a subject for 
another time.
  I recall after 9/11, Bill Bennett coming to my hometown of Tyler, 
Texas, and speaking at Tyler Junior College. And there was a huge crowd 
that turned out. People, in fact, turned out during those few months 
after 9/11 in record numbers to their churches and to places of worship 
in record numbers. Because much like the children of Israel after a 
disaster, they realized they needed to get back closer to our Creator.
  The FBI, our intelligence attributes, all of our Justice Department, 
State Department and all of the Bush administration immediately was 
pushed into gear to do something to protect us. And in that regard, 
Bill Bennett speaking there in Tyler said, Some people get offended if 
they look somewhat like someone who committed the worst attack in 
American history and they're searched more thoroughly than perhaps 
someone else.
  And Bill said, I just know that if there was a red-headed Irishman 
that had attacked the United States, he said, I could anticipate having 
to go through heightened security checks every time I try to fly, every 
time I try to go anywhere. And he said, If that were to happen, I would 
understand because, he said, I love this country. I want people to be 
safe and feel safe, and since someone who looked like me with red hair 
and my same heritage had committed that act, even though he was and is 
a law-abiding citizen, he would understand being subjected to more 
scrutiny.
  There was a time in this country when common sense like that did 
prevail, when no one would have ever dreamed that in going through 
security at an airport and somebody like me asking, why did I get 
pulled aside for the extra inspection and the puffery and all the added 
scrutiny, and being told, you look like you wouldn't get mad. That told 
me a lot. I stood there and watched for about 20 minutes. There were a 
couple of African American businessmen, well dressed, they were pulled 
aside for the heightened scrutiny. They certainly had no resemblance to 
anybody that had attacked America on 9/11. A little old lady, one of 
our seniors, full of vim, vigor and spirit, she was pulled aside. 
Anyway, interesting times.
  I think our Justice Department, some of our folks who are supposed to 
be looking out for our protection have been lulled into a false sense 
of security, and they have done what some say

[[Page H898]]

would be to respond to the squeaky wheel. The OIC, the 57 Islamic 
nations that make up the OIC, are the ones that invented the term 
``Islamophobia,'' and it was Islamic nations that have funded some of 
our Ivy League schools, institutions of higher learning yearning for 
more dollars to accept massive contributions in return for their doing 
seminars and conferences on Islamophobia and trying to make Americans 
think there's something wrong with them if they fear the people who 
brought about 9/11.

                              {time}  2010

  Now, I am grateful for my Muslim friends. I am very grateful for the 
Muslim allies we had--and have, although this administration is 
throwing them under the bus--that we have in northern Afghanistan, the 
Northern Alliance, those in the Balochistan area of Pakistan. We've got 
Muslim friends all over the world. We have Muslim friends in this 
country who love the freedom here, who don't want to see this country 
hurt.
  But there are those who have contributed to terrorism. There are 
those who have come here from other countries who hope to see our 
demise. My brother, who was living out north of the beltway, was 
shocked on 9/11, that afternoon, to see in a Muslim area north of the 
beltway children jumping and yelling and rejoicing over the deaths of 
Americans in the Pentagon and in the 9/11 towers. There was a time when 
Americans would have had more sensitivity than that. They would be so 
grateful to be in America they would not rejoice in the loss of 
innocent lives by Islamic jihadists.
  The 9/11 Commission, bipartisan as it was, came to conclusions--with 
all of which I don't agree--but they made a very good-faith effort. 
They came to the conclusion about certain things, and it was clear that 
the actions of the terrorists that killed over 3,000 Americans were 
those of Islamic extremists, not rank-and-file, but Islamic extremists 
who believed that jihad meant the destruction of our way of life here 
in America, of Americans as infidels because they do not believe the 
same way.
  Who would have believed that 10\1/2\ years later the mean people 
would not be those who have refused to denounce terrorist activities, 
those groups who have not only refused to denounce terrorist activity 
but who have actually supported terrorist activity through Hamas and 
Hezbollah--known terrorist organizations--and against whom there is 
sufficient evidence, as found by a district court in Texas and by the 
Federal Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, sufficient evidence to move 
forward with the case. That's because the judge in the district court, 
Judge Solis, and the Fifth Circuit agreed that there was prima facia 
evidence of Muslim groups here in America who were named but unindicted 
coconspirators in funding terrorism, ``prima facia'' meaning adequate 
evidence to basically go forward. In fact, the words ``prima facia'' 
were used by Judge Solis in his decision.
  Well, the FBI, over the years, seems to have relaxed in some regards, 
wanting to avoid being called Islamophobic, as the 57 Islamic states 
have shoved that notion further and further across our Nation, have 
pushed to meet one of their 10-year stated goals, as found in the 
materials of the Muslim Brotherhood archives found across the river in 
Virginia in a subbasement.
  One of those goals was to subvert--actually subject the U.S. 
Constitution to sharia law; and the way to do that was to force a 
pronouncement that in America you could burn a Bible, you could put a 
cross in urine, you could call Christians all kinds of names, blaspheme 
Jesus Christ, you can burn an American flag, call the American 
Government all kinds of names, but under no circumstances should anyone 
defile a Koran.
  As a Christian, I do not think anyone should ever abuse a Koran in 
any way. But the Constitution says if somebody wants to burn a Bible, 
that's been interpreted to mean you can burn a Bible. It's a freedom of 
speech issue. If you want to burn a flag, we're told you can do that.
  Well, we had the Director of the FBI come before our Judiciary 
Committee in the not-too-distant past. And these are some of the 
documents that have been involved in the prosecution of the Holy Land 
Foundation in which groups like the Islamic Society of North America, 
CAIR, others, were named coconspirators. In any event, Director 
Mueller, March 16 of last year, before our Judiciary Committee, had 
testified in answer to a number of questions that, gosh, they viewed 
the Muslim community as absolutely the same as any other community, 
even those Muslim communities that rejoiced over 9/11--he didn't say 
this, but it was clear--that rejoiced over the deaths of Americans on 
9/11. They saw them just like every other community. He also testified 
about the positive outreach that the FBI had been making to Muslim 
communities.
  Well, I don't have a problem with that, but why would the FBI see the 
need to make positive outreach into any community of a specific nature?
  So, after Director Mueller had indicated, yes, we have this wonderful 
outreach program with the Muslim communities and those communities are 
exactly like every other community, I said:

       You had mentioned earlier--and it is in your written 
     statement--that the FBI has developed extensive outreach to 
     Muslim communities. And in answer to an earlier question, I 
     understood you to say that Muslim communities were like all 
     other communities. So I'm curious, as a result of the 
     extensive outreach program the FBI has had to the Muslim 
     community, how has your outreach program gone with the 
     Baptists and the Catholics?

  Mr. Mueller said:

       I am not certain of necessarily the thrust of that 
     question. I would say that our outreach to all segments of a 
     particular city or county or society is good.

  I said:

       Well, do you have a particular program of outreach to 
     Hindus, Buddhists, Jewish community, agnostics, or is it just 
     an extensive outreach program to----

  He interrupted and said:

       We have outreach to every one of those communities.

  I asked how he did that. And he started to filibuster. I said:

       I have looked extensively, and I haven't seen anywhere in 
     any one from the FBI's letters information that there has 
     been an extensive outreach program to any other community 
     trying to develop trust in this kind of relationship, and it 
     makes me wonder if there is an issue of trust or some problem 
     like that that the FBI has seen in that particular community.

                              {time}  2020

  And just so there's no mistaking, let me just read directly from the 
judge's opinion in the Holy Land Foundation case in response to the 
effort by ISNA, CAIR, NAIT, the Holy Land Foundation, and others.
  The judge said:

       The government has produced ample evidence to establish the 
     associations of CAIR, ISNA, and NAIT with the Holy Land 
     Foundation, the Islamic Association for Palestine, and with 
     Hamas. While the Court recognizes that the evidence produced 
     by the government largely predates the HLF designation date, 
     the evidence is nonetheless sufficient to show the 
     association of these entities with the Holy Land Foundation, 
     the Islamic Association for Palestine, and Hamas.

  There was plenty of evidence to support that, according to the judge. 
That was affirmed by the Fifth Circuit.
  It is important to note that, out of concern for the FBI's outreach 
program, and the State Department, and the White House, for reaching 
out and bringing in people who courts have said have supported 
terrorism, and these people are being brought in--in the military we 
said brought inside the wire--in this case, brought inside the State 
Department, brought inside The White House on a regular basis, brought 
inside the Justice Department, my friend, Frank Wolf, had this language 
added to the continuing resolution that was passed, that President 
Obama signed into law. This is language in the law, and my friend, Mr. 
Wolf, included it to reference the FBI's policy.
  It says, and this is the language in the law:

       Conferees support the FBI's policy prohibiting any formal 
     non-investigative cooperation with unindicted coconspirators 
     in terrorism cases. The conferees expect the FBI to insist on 
     full compliance with this policy by FBI field offices, and to 
     report to the Committees on Appropriations regarding any 
     violation of the policy.

  Well, guess what? We didn't get this from the FBI. We had to get it 
from the Islamic Society of North America's own Web site. They reported 
that on Wednesday, February 8, that's this year, the American Arab 
Anti-discrimination Committee, the Arab American

[[Page H899]]

Institute, the Interfaith Alliance, the Islamic Society of North 
America, ISNA, which has been pronounced by the Fifth Circuit as having 
plenty of evidence to support that they fund terrorism and have, and 
then it mentions other groups, including the Shoulder-to-Shoulder 
Campaign.
  But they, it says:

       They had an opportunity to discuss the matter with the 
     Public Affairs Office of the FBI. Director Robert Mueller 
     joined the meeting to discuss these matters with 
     representatives from the organizations.

  The conversation with Director Mueller centered on material used by 
the agency that depicts falsehoods and negative connotations of the 
Muslim American community. The use of the material was first uncovered 
by Wired magazine.

  And that was uncovered by an organization that seems to be right in 
there with those who were unindicted but named coconspirators in 
funding terrorism.
  Well, from ISNA they say:

       Director Mueller informed the participants that the FBI 
     took the review of the training material very seriously, and 
     he pursued the matter with urgency to ensure that this does 
     not occur again in the future.

  ISNA President Imam Magid, who's a frequent visitor to the White 
House, who the White House consults on speeches, or has, and welcomed 
to the inner sanctum of the State Department, other Departments here in 
Washington, Magid stated:

       The discovery of FBI training materials that discriminated 
     against Muslims did damage to the trust that was built 
     between dedicated FBI officials and the American Muslim 
     community. We welcome and appreciate Director Mueller's 
     commitment to take positive steps toward eradicating such 
     materials and rebuilding trust in an open dialogue.
       The director also informed participants that to date, 
     nearly all related FBI training materials, including more 
     than 160,000 pages of documents, were reviewed by subject 
     matter experts multiple times. Consequently, more than 700 
     documents, 300 presentations of material, have been deemed 
     unusable by the Bureau and pulled from the training 
     curriculum. Material was pulled from the curriculum if even 
     one component was deemed to include factual errors or be in 
     poor taste or be stereotypical, or lack precision.

  I guess stereotypical would mean if they point out that terrorists 
have had one thing in common, that that would be stereotypical.
  Well, ISNA also reports:

       It was clear to all meeting participants that the issue of 
     trust between community members and the FBI needs to be taken 
     seriously by all our nation's decisionmakers. It was evident 
     the Bureau must strengthen its efforts to build trust.

  How about trust from the other side? How about condemnation of 
terrorist acts?
  How about coming out and making clear all ties have been severed with 
Hamas and Hezbollah and those who would seek to make terror on innocent 
people?
  Anyway, ISNA's rejoicing because they've gotten the FBI to actually 
go through and cull material that includes words like jihad, words like 
Islamist.
  And, in fact, and I really do wish, Mr. Speaker, that our Director of 
the FBI would be as concerned about this law as he is about laws that 
don't exist, but his concern is about offending people who have been 
supporting terrorism that has been killing innocent people around the 
world.
  Instead, this is what we have as a result of the efforts by this 
administration and the Director of the FBI. The 9/11 Commission report 
mentioned 322 times Islam because the people who were the hijackers, 
the people that planned the attacks, that hoped that they would kill 
tens of thousands of Americans instead of 3,000, those who helped train 
them in Afghanistan, those who helped plan and participate from other 
radical Islamist groups, they were Islamists. They believed in Islam. 
And thank God that they only represent a tiny percentage of Muslims 
around the world. But let's be realistic. As one intelligence officer 
said, we are blinding ourselves to being able to see who our enemy is.
  Well, our FBI can be very, very proud. No longer in training 
materials, as the director told the named coconspirator of terrorism, 
ISNA, no longer are they going to mention Islam, Muslim, jihad, enemy. 
They don't mention the Muslim Brotherhood. They don't mention Hamas. 
They don't mention Hezbollah. They don't mention al Qaeda. They don't 
mention caliphate. They don't mention sharia law.
  Those have been wiped clean from our training materials so that new 
FBI trainees, people coming in, will have no idea exactly what they're 
facing because they're being told, you must look only at a group as 
supporting heightened violence. But you cannot examine their books, 
things that mean very much to them, things that motivate these killers, 
these terrorists. You can't look at the things and their 
interpretations, what makes them tick.
  How do you defeat an enemy if you cannot look at what makes them 
think the way they do? I would think that groups, our Muslim friends 
who want to help keep this country free, instead of demanding that we 
not realize that these are Islamic jihadists that want to kill us, that 
they would be out there pointing these people out publicly and 
condemning them. Instead, they're condemning those who simply want to 
protect America, who want to live in peace, want to live in freedom.

                              {time}  2030

  Imagine what these same kind of groups would have said if they had 
heard the prayer on D-day, live? Can you imagine these groups hearing 
Franklin Roosevelt's prayer on radio as he prayed for 6-to-10 minutes 
publicly, a prayer that you can find online?

       Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our Nation, this day have 
     set up on a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our 
     Republic, our religion, and our civilization to set free a 
     suffering humanity.

  He goes on and prays for a very long time on D-day as our troops were 
trying to retake Europe.
  He also says in his prayer:

       And, O Lord, give us faith. Give us faith in Thee; faith in 
     our sons; faith in each other; faith in our crusade. Let not 
     the keenness of our spirit ever be dulled. Let not the 
     impacts of temporary events, of temporal matters of but 
     fleeting moment--let not these deter us in our unconquerable 
     purpose. With Thy blessing, we shall prevail over the unholy 
     forces of our enemy.

  Back then, Roosevelt didn't know you couldn't call your enemy that 
wanted to take over your Nation, that wanted to kill innocent people, 
that wanted to take away your liberty, Roosevelt didn't know you 
couldn't call them unholy forces of our enemy. So he used those terms 
because he cared about America. He cared about protecting America.
  We want to live in peace. We want to live in peace with our Muslim 
friends, our Hindu friends, our agnostics, our atheists. But for 
heaven's sake, do not keep blinding our intelligence community, our 
justice community.
  There was a time when in America you could call things just as they 
were, and in the Revolution one of the most quoted statements was 
attributed to Voltaire:

       I disagree with what you say but will defend to the death 
     your right to say it.

  Now, when someone disagrees with what you say, they want to destroy 
your life, destroy your livelihood.
  It's time for America to wake up before we get hit again. We have 
people in this country who are supporting terrorism. There's prima 
facie evidence to establish it; the courts have found it. This 
administration refused to pursue it when the evidence was clearly 
there, refused to pursue these people; and instead of pursuing the 
unindicted coconspirators after the convictions and the Holy Land 
Foundation--oh, sure, this administration says, Well, the Bush 
administration wasn't going to. The Bush administration was going to 
pursue the unindicted coconspirators if they got convictions in the 
Holy Land Foundation trial, which they did, near the end of 2008.
  It's this administration that refused to go forward and prosecute 
anyone further.
  So instead of prosecuting people supporting terrorism, this 
administration calls them into the White House, calls them into the 
Justice Department and says why can't we be friends.
  It's time to wake up. We owe this country a defense with our eyes 
open, with our arms and heart open to help those who really are 
helpless, but to stand firm even to the death as our servicemembers are 
pledged to do, as I did my 4 years on active duty. Let's stand firm 
together until those who are intent on destroying us and supporting

[[Page H900]]

terrorism are made to account and back off and say we're no longer your 
enemy. Then all communities can worship and love as one.
  We've got to protect America.
  With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________