Muslim Brotherhood's Global Ambitions Is a Trojan Horse Within

The Muslim Brotherhood has never hidden its ambitions. In 2011, its leader, Mohammed Badie, vowed to crush "Zio-American arrogance" and impose Islam's "mastership of the world" through a global caliphate under Sharia law. Fifteen years later, that message remains unchanged.

While Congress stalls legislation designating the Brotherhood as a foreign terrorist organization (FTO) for its political, financial, and logistical support to terror affiliates like Hamas, Texas and Florida have already branded both the Brotherhood and the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) as terrorist entities. Now, President Donald Trump is directing federal agencies to consider FTO designations for the movement's branches in Jordan, Egypt, and Lebanon.

For decades, Western policymakers clung to the delusion that the Muslim Brotherhood is moderate — somehow distinct from the violent jihadism destabilizing the Middle East and infiltrating the West. That dogma is slowly collapsing. Governments increasingly recognize the Brotherhood as a toxic breeder of jihadism. Its own internal documents describe a disciplined, long-term strategy of "civilizational jihad"— exploiting our democratic freedoms and civil liberties to dismantle Western society from within.

This threat is not new. After Muhammad's death in 632 A.D., successive Islamic caliphates expanded across Europe, Asia, and Africa until the Ottoman Empire collapsed after World War I. In 1928, Egyptian Hassan al‑Banna founded the Muslim Brotherhood to resurrect an even larger empire of Islamic supremacy.

Al‑Banna explained that Islam is an all-encompassing, cradle-to-grave, way of life. He defined jihad as a binding duty to battle unbelievers, loot their wealth, and destroy their houses of worship. The Brotherhood's slogan — shared with its offshoot Hamas — leaves no ambiguity: "Allah is our objective… Jihad is our way; dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope."

Violence is foundational to Brotherhood ideology. From assassinations to mass-casualty attacks, the record is long and bloody. Hamas itself admits to being "one of the wings of the Muslim Brotherhood," calling it "the largest Islamic movement in modern times."

The Brotherhood functions as the ideological mothership, spawning a sprawling network of over 70 branches worldwide, including al-Qaida, ISIS, Jabhat-al-Nusra, and Boko Haram. While operationally independent, all are united by a commitment to Sharia totalitarianism and hatred of the West, Jews, and Israel.

This fanatical movement loathes moderate Muslims, other religions, women, homosexuals, and democracy. It peddles antisemitism, promoting the 1903 Tsarist forgery, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and the writings of Brotherhood ideologue Sayyid Qutb denouncing Jewish "abominations." The organization rejected Jewish statehood long before Israel existed. Peace with Israel? Never!

Since the 1990s, this network has targeted the West for Islamization, opportunistically aligning with far-left groups against "imperialism" and "Zionism." After Oct. 7, Hamas terrorists rebranded its atrocities as acts of "resistance" against colonialism to recruit support. Qatar's Al Jazeera news organization broadcasts Brotherhood narratives, which are then recycled by Western outlets, fueling sympathy for terrorism.

According to the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP), the Muslim Brotherhood in America poses a growing threat by infiltrating political, legal, social, and cultural institutions to Islamize our society. It has built a parallel infrastructure of mosques, schools, and legal and social services to isolate Muslims from mainstream American society in a radicalized bubble. Brotherhood-linked imams indoctrinate from pulpits, while CAIR leadership celebrates the Oct. 7 atrocities.

The money trails lead directly to terror. In 2008, the Brotherhood-linked Holy Land Foundation was convicted of funneling $12 million to Hamas. CAIR, North American Islamic Trust, and the Islamic Society of North America — staffed with Brotherhood-affiliated personnel — were named "unindicted co-conspirators" based on evidence. Yet, their operatives continue penetrating the highest levels of U.S. government.

For years, Brotherhood-aligned groups have pressured federal agencies on counterterrorism policy. The results are unmistakable: training materials were scrubbed of references to "Islamic extremism," distorting threat assessments, obscuring the ideological roots of the threat, and recasting legitimate security measures as civil rights violations.

Congressional figures like Reps. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., and Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., echo movement narratives, attend linked events, accept aligned funding, and weaponize accusations of "Islamophobia" to stifle scrutiny. The Obama and Biden administrations allowed network sympathizers into influential roles within the White House and the Department of Homeland Security. Most alarming is the election of intifada-supporting Marxist-Islamist Zohran Mamdani as mayor of New York City — global capital of capitalism.

Equally troubling is the Brotherhood's stranglehold on American universities. Campuses have become indoctrination factories. Students for Justice in Palestine — the movement's campus arm — organized coordinated nationwide protests within hours of the Oct. 7 massacre, featuring Hamas flags and identical slogans and graphics, suggesting foreknowledge of the attack. The Brotherhood, via Qatar, also influences Middle East studies curricula and trains K-12 teachers in Islamized education to shape young minds.

Bipartisan legislation from Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Rep. Jared Moskowitz, D-Fla., argues that the Brotherhood's global network meets statutory requirements: It is foreign, has the capability to or engages in terrorism, and poses a direct threat to U.S. national security. Trump's Executive Order targeting individual branches attempts to circumvent claims that the network's decentralization complicates designation.

Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the UAE, Bahrain, and Russia have already labeled the Brotherhood a terrorist organization. Doing the same here would enable asset freezes, leadership sanctions, visa bans, and criminal penalties. Without it, our defenses remain ineffective.

The Muslim Brotherhood is a Trojan horse inside our walls. ISGAP warns it has achieved extraordinary "policy influence, narrative control, and institutional penetration" while hiding behind claims of civil rights and religious freedom.

America must dismantle this existential threat. The only question is: Do we have the will to act?