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President Donald Trump said Sunday he plans to designate the Muslim Brotherhood as a foreign terrorist organization, a move he described as long overdue and one that would carry “the strongest and most powerful terms.”
“It will be done in the strongest and most powerful terms,” President Trump told Just the News. “Final documents are being drawn.”
The president’s comments came days after the outlet published an investigation detailing internal debates over the Brotherhood’s global influence and its status inside the administration. The Muslim Brotherhood, founded in Egypt nearly a century ago, operates through affiliated political parties, charities and activist networks across the Middle East and beyond.
The renewed push follows action by Republican officials in Texas, where Gov. Greg Abbott last week labeled both the Muslim Brotherhood and the Council on American-Islamic Relations as “foreign terrorist organizations and transnational criminal organizations.”
CAIR has denied the accusation and filed a lawsuit, arguing the Texas order violates constitutional rights. According to Politico, “CAIR says that proclamation, which bars its members from buying land in Texas, violates its members’ constitutional property and free speech rights.”
Lawmakers in both chambers of Congress, including some Democrats, have urged the State Department to make the designation. Several U.S. allies have already taken action. Egypt and Jordan have banned the organization, while Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain have formally designated it as a terrorist group, Just the News reported.
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, has also pushed federal action. Cruz introduced a bill this summer urging the State Department to give the Brotherhood the foreign terrorist organization designation. “The Muslim Brotherhood is a terrorist organization,” he said, arguing that its affiliates include Hamas, which he noted “committed the worst single-day massacre of Jews since the Holocaust” on Oct. 7.
Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart, R-Fla., and Rep. Jared Moskowitz, D-Fla., reintroduced the Muslim Brotherhood Terrorist Designation Act of 2025, calling it a modernized framework for evaluating the global movement. “It is crucial to U.S. national security interests that we prohibit U.S. dollars from enabling the Muslim Brotherhood’s dangerous activities,” Díaz-Balart said.