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Sen. Cory Booker and the top U.S. counter-terrorism official sparred Tuesday over DNI Tulsi Gabbard’s reference to Paterson, New Jersey’s Muslim community during her speech to AmericaFest earlier this week.
Booker, D-N.J., took issue with part of director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard’s speech to AmericaFest in Phoenix over the weekend, where she called out threats to the U.S. homeland from Islamist ideology.
Booker ripped Gabbard for name-dropping his state’s third-largest city, Paterson. The city, between New York City and the Delaware Water Gap, is named for Irish immigrant and Constitution signatory William Paterson but has a sizable, growing Arab Christian and Muslim community.
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Sen. Cory Booker, left, and Tulsi Gabbard, right, at a Democratic presidential debate. (Saul Loeb/Getty Images)
“Paterson is one of New Jersey’s oldest cities and has always embodied the best American values — industry, perseverance, and diversity,” Booker tweeted Tuesday.
“Tulsi Gabbard’s dangerous attempt to sow fear, pit people against each other, and smear the Muslim Americans of Paterson, NJ is dishonest, cruel, and un-American — it endangers an entire community,” said Booker, who hails from nearby Newark.
Paterson reportedly has the second-highest percentage of Muslims behind Muslim-majority Hamtramck, Michigan. Paterson’s sister city is Ramallah, in the Palestinian West Bank, according to WKXW.
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“In Jersey, we know our state’s diversity is our strength, and we stand up for our own,” Booker said.
During her speech, Gabbard warned that Islamist ideology fuels terror groups that should be defeated “militarily” but also presents a “direct threat to freedom” because it is effectively “political” thought.
Gabbard warned that such ideology is both political and a direct threat to freedom because it seeks to “create a global caliphate that governs us here in America” and seeks enforcement of Sharia Law governance.
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“If you fail to comply, if you fail to adhere to this ideology, if you dare to exercise your God-given right to free speech, censorship is not what we face. They will use violence or any means they deem as necessary to silence us,” Gabbard warned during her Phoenix address, before noting that German cities have canceled Christmas festivals due to the threat of radical Islamists; warning some may be taking root in America.
“In places like Dearborn, Michigan, and Minneapolis, Minnesota, Islamist clerics are openly pushing this Islamist ideology, trying to recruit and radicalize young people,” she went on, saying that advocacy-group-backed efforts to institute Sharia law are already in place in Houston, Texas, and Paterson, New Jersey.
“Paterson is proud to call themselves the first Muslim city. They are working to implement in their own governments these Islamic principles that are forced on people through the use of laws or violence,” she said.
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“The bottom line is this. When we talk about the threat of Islamism, this political ideology, there is no such thing as individual freedom or liberty. As Charlie [Kirk] said over and over again, it is fundamentally incompatible with our nation’s foundation of freedom.”
Paterson, which has struggled for years with crime and corruption problems — including the indictment of Councilman Michael Jackson and others on pending election fraud charges, collectively rebuked Gabbard’s claim that its Muslim community posed any kind of threat.
Mayor Andre Sayegh, a Democrat, called Gabbard “egregiously misinformed” at a press conference called to rebuke the former Hawaii congresswoman.
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“We’re a better city because Muslims call Paterson home. It’s a point of pride that they contribute to the social and economic fabric of Paterson,” he said.
In terms of laws passed in Paterson, in 2020, the city council approved an ordinance allowing the Adhan — or Muslim call to worship — to be broadcast in the city. Imam Quddoos Farra’d told the Paterson Times that it is no different from Christians using churchbells or Jews using a Shofar.
However, National Counterterrorism Center Director Joe Kent, a Washington state Republican nominated by President Donald Trump, staunchly defended Gabbard and slammed Booker.
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“The insane policies championed by Booker and the Democrat Party under the Biden administration have allowed a staggering 18,000 known and suspected terrorists to enter our nation, many through the botched Afghanistan withdrawal and the open southern border,” Kent said.
“This disastrous approach has put American lives at risk, prioritizing unchecked borders over national security.”
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“In the last year, Muslim jihadis have carried out successful attacks in New Orleans, Colorado, and Washington D.C., spreading terror from coast to coast, while our dedicated law enforcement heroes have thwarted over a dozen more jihadist plots, preventing even greater devastation.”
Kent said it was Gabbard who exposed threats from 2,000 Afghan evacuees under Biden’s Operation Allies Welcome who had ties to terrorism — and that the DNI is “confronting the dangers recklessly inflicted on our nation by cowards like Booker and Biden.”
