A Real Clear Wire report
Topline: A nonprofit previously led by antisemitic activist Linda Sarsour received over $4.1 million of public funding from 2017 to 2024, according to public records reviewed by Open the Books.
Key facts: The Arab American Association of New York brought in $3.3 million from New York City and $854,000 from New York State. Almost all of the state-level payments came from the Department of State, but most of the city funding has no agency name attached to it.
The largest payment was a $1 million transfer from New York City in 2023.
Sarsour led the nonprofit from 2005 to 2017, and since then has made headlines for what her critics see as support of violence against Jews. She vocally opposed the U.S.’s deportation of Rasmea Odeh, who was convicted of murdering two Israeli college students at a supermarket in Jerusalem. At the 2018 Islamic Society of North America Convention, Sarsour gave a speech arguing that Jewish people should not be “humanized.”
Open the Books also found $332,000 in federal taxpayer money and $14,000 from local school districts sent to the Islamic Society of North America, where Imam Siraj Wahhaj was the vice president.
Wahhaj — who Sarsour called “a mentor and motivator and encourager of mine” — was named by the FBI as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, though he denies any involvement.
During the ensuing trials, Wahhaj, decades-long imam at Masjid At-Taqwa, a mosque in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn, testified in support of Omar Abdel-Rahman and called him a “respected scholar.” Abdel-Raham was later sentenced to life in prison for seditious conspiracy and reportedly told co-conspirators that murdering civilians was acceptable.
Wahhaj has also said that homosexuality is a “disease.” In one sermon, he encouraged followers to make gay people “uncomfortable” until they become straight and reminded listeners, “The Prophet Mohammad said the one who does it [homosexuality] and the one whom it is done to, kill them both.”
Search all federal, state and local salaries and vendor spending with the world’s largest government spending database at OpenTheBooks.com.
Background: Given Sarsour’s role as a mentor to New York City mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, it’s fair to wonder whether the Arab American Association or Islamic Society will receive increased funding under his administration. Mamdani also has a positive relationship with Wahhaj.
The Arab American Association previously lobbied for a bill Mamdani introduced in the state assembly that would have banned New York nonprofits from “engaging in unauthorized support for Israeli settlement activity.”
Mamdani and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul did not answer inquiries from the Free Beacon asking if they will continue funding the Arab American Association.
Sarsour has also bragged that the Unity and Justice Fund PAC — funded by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) — was Mamdani’s largest institutional donor in New York. CAIR Executive Director Nihad Awad previously said the Oct. 7 terrorist attack against Israel made him “happy.”
Summary: As the U.S. political climate becomes more and more polarized, it’s vital that taxpayers are aware when public funding supports radical views.
The #WasteOfTheDay is brought to you by the forensic auditors at OpenTheBooks.com
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