Keith Ellison is No. 56 on the Telegraph (UK) list of 100 Most Influential U.S. Liberals. (As far as I can tell from a quick glance the only Muslim on the list. Top 20 haven’t come out yet.)
Latest Updates: Keith Ellison RSS
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abunoor
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buzz
Challenger to Keith Ellison wants to unseat Michelle Bachman as the craziest bigot in Congress.
Lynne Torgerson, who wants to unseat U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison in Minnesota’s 5th District, says she’s “big on freedom of speech and freedom of religion, as establishment by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.” Those freedoms evidently don’t apply to Muslims such as Ellison, however, judging by the language she uses on her campaign Web site.
Torgerson, a criminal defense lawyer, who graduated from the University of Minnesota and William Mitchell College writes on her campaign Web site, “What do I know of Islam? Well, I know of 911. Nineteen (19) men from Saudi Arabia, all Muslim, hi-jacked planes, and flew into the two (2) World Trade Towers murdering thousands of people, and tried to fly into our Pentagon, and some believe they also tried to fly an airplane into our White House. From this, what I perceive is Islam conducting an act of war against my country.”
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abunoor
U.S. Congress votes 344-36 to denounce the Goldstone report.
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johnpi
Congressman rebukes fellow Muslim for linking Islam to terrorism.
Congressman Keith Ellison denounced Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, President of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, for warning that political Islam has a militant strain that’s used to justify terrorism.
Jasser told a congressional briefing that terrorism won’t be stopped until his Islamic faith goes through its own Reformation to separate mosque and state.
Ellison responded by accusing Jasser of giving people a “license for bigotry.”
The Minnesota Democrat said every religion has its violent extremists, and told Jasser, “I think people who want to engage in nothing less than Muslim-hating really love you a lot, because you give them freedom to do that.”
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johnpi
This will be a political nonstarter, as it is intended to help the two groups that are most loathed by the still-very-powerful religious right – gays and immigrants. Supporters however see it as part of a multi-year effort to compel passage.
Reps. Keith Ellison and Betty McCollum are cosponsoring legislation that would help bi-national same-sex couples keep their families together. Called the Uniting American Families Act, the legislation would allow non-citizen partners of gays and lesbians to gain permanent resident status in the same manner as married couples.
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johnpi
Breaking news from America’s two Muslim Congressional reps.
The news is their continuing silence.
• Andre Carson, who vote for House resolution 34 supporting Israel’s action in Gaza, has said absolutely nothing, not even to explain his original vote. His web page is here.
• Keith Ellison, who voted “present” on resolution 34, did publish an explanation on his website last Friday of his reason for neither supporting nor opposing the resolution. Nothing in the six days since. His website is here.
Since their votes, news coverage of the Gaza incursion has given overwhelming evidence of the brutal and illgal nature of Israel’s campaign against Gaza and its effects upon the large numbers of civilian victims.
I say both reps could go a long way to recovering their reputations if they admitted their mistaken positions and denounced any or all of the many atrocities that are breaking across the news wires and began working NOW to stop the violence. Israel’s using white phosphorus shells, Israel bans Arab political parties, Israel bombs schools, medical clinics, refugee centers, UN headquarters, a city densely populated with civilians that have been given no escape to flee the fighting – Reps. Ellison and Carson could cite any or all of these atrocities as weighing on their conscience and motivating them to speak against Israel’s attack.
I encourage the two congressional reps. to have a late-breaking crisis of conscience and use the power of their office and status as public officials to advocate against the israeli action in Gaza. But it has to be now, during the fighting when it might do some good, not next year when they are running for reelection.
I also think it’s weak to just dump on them without giving them a chance to respond, so I called Reps. Ellison and Carson’s Washington DC offices and invited them to respond here at TalkIslam.info and at my blog to explain where they stand now and why or why not they aren’t doing more about the carnage in Gaza. If the Reps. won’t write an article or blog post, then I’ll pass along whatever statement their communications people send back. Or maybe the silence will continue.
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abunoor
Tariq has video of Rep. Keith Ellison getting shouted down at a rally for Gaza by Muslims upset over his “Present” vote on the Congressional resolution to support Israel’s massacre in Gaza refusal to condemn the Israeli invasion of Gaza. He later voted “Present” on a Congressional resolution expressing support for Israel’s actions in Gaza.
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johnpi
Smearcasting Islamophobe Steven Emerson has been given a platform by Fox News to go after Keith Ellison’s Hajj trip to Mecca as a junket funded by the Muslim American Society of Minnesota, a “front for the Muslim Brotherhood” and “the Muslim equivalent of the neo-Nazi party,” etc., etc., ad nauseam.
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Tariq Nelson
Everyone seems to be split on this financial bailout. Democrats and Republicans voted on both sides. Even Congress’ two Muslim representatives were split on the issue
Ellison: ‘yes’
Carson: ‘no’
