President-elect Donald Trump is reportedly preparing to jumpstart a bill in Congress that would ban the Muslim Brotherhood by declaring it a terrorist organization.

Trump foreign-policy adviser Walid Phares told Egyptian news outlet Youm7 that the legislation, introduced a year ago by Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, was held up due to the Obama administration's support of the group. But Trump plans to back the bill.

Cruz's bill, the Muslim Brotherhood Terrorist Designation Act of 2015-16, identifies the Brotherhood and three of its offshoots, including the Council on American-Islamic Relations and Islamic Society of North America, as a terrorist organization.

The Brotherhood is already banned as a subversive organization in Russia and at least five Arab countries, including Syria, Saudi Arabia and its home base of Egypt. And the Brotherhood's self-avowed "Palestine" branch – Hamas – was added to the U.S. State Department's list of foreign terrorist organizations in 1997.

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Former Rep. Michele Bachmann, who introduced similar legislation during her last term in office, said such action is long overdue. It has been clear since the Holy Land Foundation terror financing trial in 2007-08 that the Brotherhood is working through front groups toward an agenda of Islamic supremacy, which the Brotherhood calls "civilization jihad."

"First, it is imperative to know the enemy," Bachmann told WND. "The fundamental purpose of the Muslim Brotherhood is to supplant all societal structures, even in non-Islamic countries like the United States, with Islamic Shariah law."

What do YOU think? Should Trump ban the Muslim Brotherhood from the U.S.? Sound off in today's WND poll

When Bachmann introduced her legislation in 2012, she named Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's top aide, Huma Abedin, as an example of the Muslim Brotherhood agents who have infiltrated the federal government. She came under intense pressure to drop the issue from both Democrats and Republicans. Among her critics was former Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., who called Abedin "an American patriot."

"I have no information in my committee that would indicate that Huma is anything other than an American patriot," Rogers told USA Today in 2012.

Bachmann recommends Steve King for DHS secretary

Rogers' name has been tossed out, along with that of Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, as possible choices that Trump is considering for the job of secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.

Bachmann said said she would like to see Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, get the job.

"King's was the most consistent, logical voice on building a wall and securing America's borders," she said.

King is also one of 68 House co-sponsors of the Muslim Brotherhood Terrorist Designation Act.

The Brotherhood was founded in Egypt in 1928 by Hasan al-Banna. In the 1970s, it transitioned from a primarily nationalist group seeking to Islamize Egypt to an international network seeking to spread the concepts of Shariah throughout the world. It now has franchised affiliates in more than 70 countries.

The Brotherhood employs different strategies for different countries. In Western democracies such as the U.S. and Canada, it seeks to destroy those countries "from within" through a process it calls "civilization jihad."

Meet the Muslim Brotherhood inside the U.S. 'Muslim Mafia' exposes infamous terror-tied group CAIR.

The FBI raided a Muslim Brotherhood safe house in 2004 and discovered key documents that laid out the strategic plan for subjugating America under Shariah. The document, "An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America" stated that the Brotherhood's "work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and 'sabotaging' its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God's religion is made victorious over all other religions. Without this level of understanding, we are not up to this challenge and have not prepared ourselves for Jihad yet. It is a Muslim's destiny to perform Jihad and work wherever he is and wherever he lands until the final hour comes, and there is no escape from that destiny except for those who chose to slack."

The document sets out a plan to establish "settlements" for Islam in the United States and "present Islam as a civilization alternative," which "supports the global Islamic State wherever it is."

The Brotherhood's longtime motto is:

"Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. The Quran is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope. [Allah is greater!]"

Yet the Brotherhood and its various offshoots, such as CAIR and ISNA – are not only able to operate legally in America but have been offered seats at the highest echelons of power, in the White House, in the halls of Congress, in the military and in the departments of Justice and Homeland Security.

The Democrats are considering placing Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., who has been an enthusiastic supporter of CAIR and ISNA, into the party's leadership as chairman of the Democratic National Committee, or DNC. Ellison is one of two Muslims in Congress, the other being Andre Carson, D-Ind.

Various Islamic charities and leaders tied to the Brotherhood were already found to have been funding Hamas terrorists during the Holy Land Foundation trial of 2008.

"Across the U.S. are Muslim Brotherhood front groups which need to be exposed and dismantled," Bachmann said. "The Muslim brotherhood's goals include the overthrow of our constitutional republic.

"In President Trump, we have someone willing to recognize America's enemies and defeat them. This is welcome and long overdue."

Dr. Mark Christian, a former imam who grew up in Cairo, Egypt, the son of a prominent Muslim Brotherhood operative, agrees that taking down the Brotherhood is not enough. Trump will need to go after all of its front groups, like CAIR, ISNA, NAIT and the Muslim Student Association.

What do YOU think? Should Trump ban the Muslim Brotherhood from the U.S.? Sound off in today's WND poll

Invited into White House in 1996

Christian, founder of the Global Faith Institute, said the Brotherhood was invited into the White House by the Clintons in 1996 and has been ensconced there ever since. Every president since, including George W. Bush, has hosted Ramadan dinners and offered praise of Islam as a "religion of peace."

When the leader of the free world embraces a terrorist organization, it alienates peaceful, reformist Muslims not only in America but across the world, Christian said.

That's why President el-Sisi of Egypt was the first foreign leader to call and congratulate Trump on his victory.

"Sisi and his government in Egypt are celebrating because Trump won," Christian said.

"Since 1996, the Muslim Brotherhood has been introduced into our government, into our military, and into our religious organizations under the cover of 'interfaith' dialogue, and so designating the Brotherhood as a terrorist organization is a very good first step, but it is way bigger than that," he added.

Many of the Brotherhood operatives in the DOJ, DHS, and FBI are graduates of U.S. colleges where they had served as leaders of the MSA, a Brotherhood front group with chapters on almost every college campus in America. This is the route to power taken by Huma Abedin, who was an MSA leader during her years at George Washington University.

Another Brotherhood operative with deep ties in the Obama administration is Khalilah Sabra. She works as an accredited representative of aliens before federal immigration courts, the Board of Immigration Appeals and the Department of Homeland Security. She openly called for a Muslim-inspired revolution in America at a Brotherhood conference on Dec. 28 in Chicago.

Meet the Muslim Brotherhood inside the U.S. 'Muslim Mafia' exposes infamous terror-tied group CAIR.

Brotherhood 'like a cancer' growing in both parties



Christian said the Brotherhood is not just tied into the Democratic Party. It has operatives who have expertise in infiltrating each of the two parties. While the Abedins and the Sabras may be on their way out, a whole new set of Brotherhood faces will be preparing to pounce on Capitol Hill who speak the language of conservative Republicans.

"You are talking about not just an organization. You are talking about a cancer that was implanted into the U.S. government more than a decade ago," said Christian, who was Muhammad Abdullah before he converted to Christianity and changed his name.

"And the cancer has been expanding ever since. With the election of Trump, you are talking about winning against the Bushes, the Obamas and the Clintons," he said. "When it comes to Islam and the Muslim Brotherhood, they are all on the same page. So you go back to 1996 and see how that cancer was implanted. To start changing the tide, you have to find and introduce the real progressive Muslims to be working with the government, and that is going to be a very tough job.

"But it can be done with the will we have seen from Donald Trump."

It will take a strong political will because any American talking about the Muslim Brotherhood as a subversive group that needs to be eliminated from the government is automatically going to be painted as an "Islamophobe" by CAIR and the other Brotherhood spinoffs. And they will have their lackeys in the media to parrot their charges of "Islamophobia."

"Because that is their last line of defense," Christian said. "The Brotherhood wants to nominate themselves as the only Muslims out there in America, and they are not."

No other GOP candidate had the will to stand up to the media pressure that comes with taking on the Brotherhood. Even Trump may buckle. Only time will tell.

But Christian is hopeful that Trump, because he thrives on challenging political correctness, can be the one to free the Muslims who are more interested in assimilating than dominating.

"There is no such a thing as peaceful and radical. There are Shariah-compliant Muslims, and there are progressive Muslims who know what the traditional Islamic teaching is capable of doing and willing to do, and they are willing to part ways from that and live in America … stepping on all of the Shariah rulings of apostasy and other things," Christian said. "They want to be modernized and want to live in the same century we live in no matter how hard it gets because they care about their families and the country we live in."

Christian believes the truly progressive Muslims are afraid to speak out in the current environment where the Islamic message in America is 100 percent controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood.

"President Sisi of Egypt is a very devout Muslim himself, but he is calling for reformation and progressiveness in the Islamic message," Christian said. "He is the one who said we have to part with the idea that for 1.6 billion Muslims to live we have to kill [or convert] the 6 billion non-Muslims. We are not talking about reformation right now. We are talking about working with those who have it in their minds that they are willing to take that step. Give them the power to make their own reformation, based on sincere and honest intentions. And there are millions out there with them. It is not only that we allowed the Muslim Brotherhood into the U.S. and into White House, but for the last 20 years America has denied those progressive Muslims a stage where their voices could be heard."

Watch Jamie Glazov explain the Muslim Brotherhood threat and why Obama shut down the prosecution that could have taken down the Brotherhood in America.

Jamie Glazov, host of the Youtube channel the Glazov Gang, believes Trump should make outlawing the Brotherhood a top priority.

"We know CAIR was involved in this financing of terror. We also know that ISNA, we know that the North American Islamic Trust, these Muslim Brotherhood front groups, were involved in terror financing, and so we were on the verge, America was on the verge, of going after these front groups and taking them out of business. … What did Eric Holder do? He stopped, he prevented the investigation and also the prosecution of these groups," Glazov said in a recent video post.

And why would the Obama administration do that?

"Why would you block the prosecution of groups designed to infiltrate America in negative ways and to destroy America? These are our enemies, they want to destroy America from within," Glazov said. "Why would you do that? We have for years unveiled why the left does these things, but I'm going to crystalize just one reason.

"It would look awfully strange if the people who are advising you, and the people you are hugging and embracing every day, and on the phone with every day, and have counseling and advising you in the FBI and other agencies, all of a sudden the next day are taken out in handcuffs. This would be a little bit embarrassing for the Obama administration, wouldn't it" But that's the case, because as many people have documented ... the Muslim Brotherhood has penetrated the White House under Obama and is framing its foreign policy and domestic policy in terms of Islamic supremacism.

"In comes Donald Trump, and what a miracle and beautiful thing it will be if Trump picks up the game now and does a very important thing and takes CAIR and these other Muslim Brotherhood front groups right out of business."

What do YOU think? Should Trump ban the Muslim Brotherhood from the U.S.? Sound off in today's WND poll

STORY UPDATE: This article was posted Monday, Nov. 14 at 8:30 p.m. On Tuesday morning the Trump team announced former Rep. Mike Rogers has left the Trump transition team.