Barack Obama welcomed CAIR officials to hundreds of White House meetings after Arab allies designated the group a terrorist organization.
Ron DeSantis did the work the Swamp won’t do.
Now every Republican governor in America has a blueprint and is out of excuses.
How Florida's Domestic Terrorist Law Finally Closed CAIR's Doors for Good
The Council on American-Islamic Relations taped a notice to the inside of its Tampa office window and walked away from the state of Florida this month.
CAIR didn't leave voluntarily.
Federal Judge Allen Winsor of the Northern District of Florida denied the group's emergency request to block the state's terrorist designation – and within hours, CAIR-Florida executive director Hiba Rahim announced the doors would be shutting indefinitely.
"We are heartbroken that we have no choice but to close our doors to protect our staff and people of all faiths who support our work," Rahim declared.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis issued an executive order designating CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood as terrorist organizations in December 2025.
A federal judge moved to block it.
Florida's legislature answered in April 2026 by passing House Bill 1471 – a new domestic terrorist organizations framework that locked DeSantis's designation authority into statute and closed the procedural gap CAIR had been exploiting in court.
CAIR sued again under the new law and lost again.
DeSantis formalized the designation in September 2026, the federal courts upheld it on November 4, and the closure notice hit the glass the next morning.
CAIR plans to appeal, but the organization is now legally barred from receiving any state contracts, employment, funds, or other benefit or privilege in Florida – and the same law they're challenging already beat them twice.
The doors are locked.
CAIR's Hamas Roots Go Back to a 1993 FBI Recording Nobody Was Supposed to Hear
The organization insists it's nothing more than a mainstream civil rights group for American Muslims.
The receipts say otherwise, and they go back 32 years.
In 1993, the FBI recorded a secret meeting in Philadelphia where leaders tied to the Muslim Brotherhood's Palestine Committee gathered to discuss how to continue supporting Hamas inside the United States.
According to testimony Lara Burns of George Washington University presented to the United States Senate in 2026, documents from that meeting showed the attendees wanted to create a front organization to shield other Hamas-linked groups from scrutiny by the government and the American press.
The group they created was CAIR.
Two of the men at that meeting – Omar Ahmad and Nihad Awad – went on to co-found the organization.
Nihad Awad still runs the organization as its executive director.
The Holy Land Foundation trial – still the largest terror financing prosecution in American history – named CAIR as an unindicted co-conspirator and ended with a conviction for funneling millions to Hamas.
The United Arab Emirates designated CAIR a terrorist group in 2014.
Barack Obama's response was to invite their officials to hundreds of White House meetings.
Then in July 2026, the Middle East Forum reported that CAIR received $7.7 million from the Islamic Development Bank – an institution in which Iran, a country the United States designated a state sponsor of terrorism, holds a seven percent voting share.
The $7.7 million came out of a larger $30 million Washington, DC plaza project that traces back to 2013.
An organization that publicly swears off foreign money took millions from a bank with Iranian government voting power.
A George Washington University study called "The Long Game" caught CAIR on paper laying out a plan to work its way into K-12 schools across the country.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott designated CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood terrorist organizations in November 2025 – DeSantis followed a month later.
Florida's difference is that DeSantis did not stop at an executive order – he went back through the legislature, built a statutory framework that survived federal court challenges, and enforced it until the doors closed.
That framework is now the blueprint.
CAIR Still Operates in 21 States Where Republican Governors Have No Excuse Not to Act
CAIR currently operates chapters in at least 21 other states, including six states with Republican governors who have yet to act.
The "Long Game" K-12 infiltration plan moves forward in every state where the governor is sitting on his hands instead of using the Florida blueprint to shut them down.
The evidence is bulletproof – the Holy Land Foundation conviction, the 1993 Philadelphia recordings, the $7.7 million from an Iran-tied bank, and Senate testimony from a George Washington University extremism researcher.
The legal roadmap is sitting right there too – Florida built it, took it through the courts, and won.
The only thing those six Republican governors are missing is the spine to use what DeSantis handed them.
Sources:
- Sarah Lee, "Florida Offers Blueprint For Other States To Shutter Islamist Terrorist Orgs Like CAIR," The Federalist, November 9, 2026.
- Fred Lucas, "CAIR Closes Up Shop in Florida After Federal Court Defeat," The Daily Signal, November 5, 2026.
- Staff, "Islamic Group CAIR Suspends Operations in Florida After Losing Lawsuit Over Terrorist Designation," The Blaze, November 5, 2026.
- Middle East Forum, "Texas Declares CAIR a Terror Group: MEF's Decade-Long Warnings Vindicated," Middle East Forum, November 2025.
