The former attorney general says the order scapegoats Muslim groups while giving too little attention to domestic extremists.
OKLAHOMA CITY — Former Oklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson says Gov. Kevin Stitt is scapegoating Muslim organizations through a state terrorism assessment that identifies no specific threat or incident in Oklahoma.
Edmondson denounced the order in a sharply worded Facebook post Friday and expanded on his criticism in an interview with OK Politics Today.
“I’ve worked with and been around CAIR before, and I’ve always considered them to be good neighbors,” Edmondson said. “As far as I’m concerned, you’ve got two innocent organizations being scapegoated.”
Stitt’s executive order directs the Oklahoma Office of Homeland Security and Department of Public Safety to assess whether the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the Muslim Brotherhood or people and organizations acting with them present a terrorism or public-safety threat.
As OK Politics Today previously reported, the order identifies no particular Oklahoma threat, incident or allegation involving CAIR. It also sets no deadline for completing the assessment and does not require the findings to be released publicly.
“I was embarrassed that our governor launched an investigation when there are so many areas that need investigation that we’re not doing anything, so far as I know,” Edmondson said.
Edmondson, a Democrat, served as attorney general from 1995 through 2011 after previously serving as Muskogee County district attorney. He was the Democratic nominee for governor in 2018, losing to Stitt.
Timing questioned
Edmondson said he believes Stitt issued the order to appeal to right-wing voters ahead of Oklahoma’s Aug. 25 runoff election.
“That it’s being done on the eve of the runoff election is also ominous,” he said. “I don’t like what that represents.”
Stitt is not on the ballot, and Edmondson did not identify which candidate he believed the order was intended to help.
The governor said Wednesday that the assessment is intended to identify danger before an attack occurs.
“Oklahomans expect their government to take terrorism seriously and to act before threats become tragedies,” Stitt said. “My administration will use every lawful tool available to protect our people, defend our values, and make sure taxpayer-funded state resources are never used to support terrorism or those who enable it.”
The order cites federal action against particular foreign branches of the Muslim Brotherhood and evidence of past associations among CAIR, the Holy Land Foundation and Hamas-related organizations. CAIR was not charged in the Holy Land Foundation case, and the federal government has not designated CAIR or the Muslim Brotherhood as a whole as a foreign terrorist organization.
Domestic threats cited
Edmondson argued that state officials should pay greater attention to domestic extremists, including anti-government Christian nationalists. He pointed to President Donald Trump’s clemency for defendants convicted of crimes connected to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Trump pardoned most of those defendants and commuted the sentences of others, including Proud Boys members convicted of serious felonies.
Edmondson also cited the 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, which killed 168 people, including 19 children.
“The biggest terrorist attack that we’ve had in this state, at least in recent history, was the attack on the Murrah Building,” Edmondson said.
He said anti-government Christian nationalists present a more immediate concern than the organizations named in Stitt’s order.
“To my way of thinking, they pose a far greater threat to this country than CAIR or the Muslim Brotherhood,” Edmondson said.
