Thursday, May 23, 2:00 PM EDT - Online
On Thursday, May 23 at 2 p.m. EST, join the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding (ISPU) and a distinguished panel of experts as they discuss the impact of legislation that unfairly targets Muslim organizations in the U.S., as well as the role of non-state actors, think tanks, and their funders in leading information manipulation campaigns against Muslim humanitarian organizations.
ISPU Director of Research Saher Selod, PhD, will join Gerald FitzGerald, PhD, Affiliated Faculty, George Mason University, Robert McCaw, Government Affairs Department Director, CAIR National, and Kia Hamadanchy, Senior Policy Counsel, ACLU, for a virtual panel discussion.
In recent years, Muslim individuals, businesses, and nonprofits in the U.S. have reported facing potentially discriminatory practices at some of the nation’s largest banks and financial institutions. In its 2022 American Muslim Poll, ISPU sought to gain an empirically grounded sense of the “banking while Muslim” phenomenon. Findings from Banking While Muslim study reveal that Muslims face challenges at a higher rate than other religious groups, prompting lawmakers to urge financial institutions to “modernize” policies that implicitly discriminate based on ethnic and religious background, impacting Muslims individuals, businesses, and nonprofits.
In the aftermath of a wave of student protests against the war on Gaza, part of a larger grassroots advocacy movement critical of U.S. policy in the Middle East, Muslim charitable, non-governmental and nonprofit organizations and institutions are facing increased scrutiny by policymakers. This has emerged in the form of media attention, statements by policy makers, and proposed legislation, such as H.R. 6408, which would give the executive branch sweeping powers to dismantle organizations the administration says has provided “material support” to terrorist organizations.
The domestic impact of the war in Gaza reaches beyond banking and charitable giving and into many sectors of American life—including higher education. Recently, ISPU Director of Research Saher Selod, PhD, authored an op-ed about the connections between perpetuating Islamophobia and policing college protesters. Read the op-ed here.