As an organization, Americans for Tax Reform (ATR) is best known for its "Taxpayer Protection Pledge," which asks candidates for federal and state office to commit themselves in writing to oppose all tax increases. The group is led by Grover Norquist, described by the Wall Street Journal as the "the V.I. Lenin of the anti-tax movement." He is renowned in right-wing and Republican circles for his ability to unite the various right-wing interests into coalitions to achieve a common goal.
Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on November 3, 2011 - 1:02pm
Just yesterday, the Washington Post noted the bizarre stranglehold that Grover Norquist and his anti-tax zealotry has over Republicans in Congress.
Today, during his weekly press conference, House Speaker John Boehner was asked by NBC's Luke Russert what he thought about Norquist's influence on Republicans, to which Boehner responded with a bizarre dismissal:
BOEHNER: Our focus here is on jobs. We're doing everything I can to get our economy going, to get people back to work. It's not often I'm asked about some random person.
RUSSERT: To your conference, is Grover Norquist a random person?
BOEHNER: Listen, our focus is on creating jobs, not talking about somebody's personality.
Ummm ...really? Because the last time we checked, it was rather uncommon for "some random person" to be seated right next to high-ranking GOP leaders like John Boehner:
Submitted by Brian Tashman on April 11, 2011 - 3:36pm
Frank Gaffney of the Center for Security Policy has repeatedly called for the conservative movement to purge Grover Norquist from the ranks, and even accused Norquist of “credentialing the perpetrators of this Muslim Brotherhood influence operation” during the controversy over CPAC. Norquist, the head of the highly influential Americans for Tax Reform, was a speaker at The Awakening despite his membership on the board of GOProud, a gay conservative group, and Gaffney’s charges of promoting Sharia law. In fact, Gaffney spoke during “Sharia Law and the Constitution” in the same room of the Thomas Road Baptist Church immediately following Norquist’s talk on “America’s Economic Condition.” During his panel, Gaffney claimed that Norquist, who co-founded the Islamic Free Market Institute, is helping advocates of Sharia law penetrate the right-wing and said it was his “personal burden for the past last twelve years to be trying to warn conservatives that one of their own has been actively involved, both enabling and empowering, Muslim Brotherhood influence operations against our movement and our country.”
Submitted by Brian Tashman on February 15, 2011 - 10:10am
While the Conservative Political Action Conference may be over, the controversy over the gathering’s handling continues. RedState Editor-in-Chief and CNN commentator Erick Erickson first criticized GOProud, the gay conservative group whose involvement in CPAC sparked a Religious Right boycott, for attacking prominent right-wing leaders. Now, Erickson is going after Grover Norquist, the head of Americans for Tax Reform and a GOProud adviser who knocked CPAC boycotters as “loser organizations.”
Norquist has long been a target of far-right groups for his outreach to Muslim Americans and gays and lesbians, and Erickson believes that his fellow conservatives should abandon and replace the Norquist-led ATR and Wednesday Meetings over his role in the CPAC controversy:
Are you a loser? If you are the Heritage Foundation, Media Research Center, Family Research Council, Concerned Women for America, the American Principles Project, Jim DeMint, Jim Jordan, Rush Limbaugh (given his comments yesterday on CPAC), and others — you are losers.
Grover Norquist says so. Norquist, last week, called those who chose not to participate in CPAC and those who share those views “losers.”
…
The source of Grover Norquist’s power comes from two things: (1) Americans for Tax Reform’s Tax Pledge, which could easily be duplicated by an organization not headed by someone who picked up checks written by a man serving 23 years in jail for financing jihad activities; and (2) the Wednesday morning meeting in which tons of conservative groups participate.
(By the way, did Grover ever give that money back or send it to a charitable cause?)
For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, Grover Norquist has an off the record meeting every Wednesday at 10:00 a.m. in which candidates come to pitch themselves, conservative organizations come to promote their wares, and even Al Gore and George Soros have come to.
It’s become a “see and be seen” sort of meeting and information exchange. Mitch McConnell typically sends someone. The House Republicans send someone. Etc., Etc., Etc.
Grover Norquist’s latest remarks, both regarding principaled [sic] social conservatives and Congressman West, are deeply troubling. If you aren’t troubled yet, google Jack Abramoff Grover Norquist.
I suggest a new Wednesday morning meeting of conservatives — one that combines the fiscal conservative organizations that constantly see their legs cut out from under them when Grover sides with UPS and the unions against FedEx, the national security organizations that continue to be concerned about Grover Norquist’s ties to possible jihadists, and the social conservative organizations Grover Norquist would like to purge from the movement.
Make it the place to plan and strategize within the conservative movement — something that does not really happen any more at Grover’s place. Make it the first step to taking back the conservative movement and moving away from the pay to play concerns that have so plagued the few, but taint so many.
Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on February 9, 2011 - 10:21am
Last year, when Grover Norquist joined the board of GOProud, many Religious Right groups voiced their displeasure, claiming he was "dishonoring" the conservative movement and questioning his integrity.
And now that many of these same Religious Right groups are boycotting CPAC this year because GOProud is involved, Norquist has again come under fire from those who claim he is a "one-man fifth column" out to destroy conservatism.
Norquist, who has participated in CPAC for decades, dismissed the complaints.
“Loser people and loser organizations that haven’t done any work all year try to get headlines so they can whine about CPAC. They can get a little press. That happens all the time,” he said.
Submitted by Brian Tashman on January 5, 2011 - 10:30am
Incensed over the participation of the conservative gay-rights group GOProud in the Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC, far-right activists are now trying to connect the major conservative event to the Muslim Brotherhood. The American Conservative Union (ACU), which hosts CPAC, has been the target of Religious Right groups and leaders over their handling of GOProud’s involvement, with Joseph Farah even calling for conservatives to “purge” the ACU from the movement. Already, the Family Research Council, Concerned Women For America, American Values, the American Principles Project, the Capital Research Center, the Center for Military Readiness, Liberty Counsel, Liberty University, and the National Organization for Marriage have announced their boycott of CPAC.
Now, the conservative news site WorldNetDaily, a major cheerleader for the groups boycotting CPAC, is giving right wing activist Frank Gaffney a platform to charge the ACU with ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, a radical Islamist group. Gaffney is no stranger to conspiracy theories, as he previously claimed that the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell “amounts to a vote for reinstating the draft,” maintained that Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan is tied to an “ominous campaign” to “bring Shariah to America,” and said that Barack Obama is “America’s first Muslim president.” He is joined by WorldNetDaily’s Paul Sperry, who wrote a book asserting that radical Muslims were infiltrating the government through the congressional internship program.
Gaffney outlines a theory that since the ACU is allowing the leader of an organization known as Muslims for America, a conservative group with ties to the GOP, to participate in CPAC, the ACU is supporting a “stealthy effort to bring Shariah” to America. He is also outraged that Grover Norquist, the head of the highly influential Americans for Tax Reform and a GOProud board member, is involved in CPAC as well. But mostly, Gaffney directs his vitriol at Suhail Khan, the chairman of the Conservative Inclusion Coalition. Both Khan and Norquist are ACU board members, and in 2009 Khan received the Young Conservatives Coalition’s Buckley Award at CPAC. But according to Gaffney, Khan has ties to radical Islamists and, along with Norquist, wants to promote a “seditious totalitarian political program” in the U.S.:
With the Conservative Political Action Conference under fire for allowing participation by a homosexual activist group called GOProud and for a financial scandal in which some $400,000 was misappropriated under the watch of current leadership, Frank Gaffney, a leader of the conservative movement for the last 30 years, charges that CPAC has come under the influence of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is working to bring America under Saudi-style Shariah law.
Gaffney, deputy assistant secretary of defense under Ronald Reagan, is founder and president of the Center for Security Policy and co-author of the new book "Shariah: The Threat to America." He told WND that Islamism has infiltrated the American Conservative Union, the host of CPAC, in the person of Washington attorney and political activist Suhail Khan and a group called Muslims for America.
Khan is a member of the ACU board and, according to Muslims for America, will assist the group's presence at CPAC during the 2011 meeting Feb. 10-12.
Gaffney also accuses another ACU board member, leading conservative political organizer Grover Norquist, of helping the Muslim Brotherhood spread its influence in the nation's capital.
…
Paul Sperry, author of "Infiltration: How Muslim Spies and Subversives Have Penetrated Washington" and "Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld That's Conspiring to Islamize America," says Khan is running "an influence operation on Capitol Hill that's quite sophisticated and slick."
"Suhail is the firstborn son of the late Mahboob Khan, a founding father of the Muslim Brotherhood movement in America," said Sperry, a Hoover Institution media fellow. "Suhail has been a consultant to CAIR [The Council on American-Islamic Relations] and served on committees at ISNA [the Islamic Society of North America], both of which the government says are fronts for Hamas and its parent the Muslim Brotherhood."
…
Gaffney describes Norquist, who, ironically also serves on the board of the controversial GOProud, as the enabler for Muslim Brotherhood associates, providing them with access into the highest reaches of the conservative movement and the Republican Party through his many contacts. Norquist, the founder of Americans for Tax Reform, hosts a weekly political organizing meeting attended by many of the leading conservatives in Washington.
"This is a ticking time bomb for the conservative community," said Gaffney. Using language reminiscent of the Cold War, Gaffney declared, "An influence operation is contributing materially to the defeat of our country, supporting a stealthy effort to bring Shariah here.
"Grover Norquist is credentialing the perpetrators of this Muslim Brotherood influence operation," he adds. "This is part of tradecraft, to get people who have standing in a community to give it to people who lack it, so they can do what they're assigned to do in terms of subversion. We are in a war, and he has been working with the enemy for over a decade."
Norquist declined to respond to WND requests for comment.
Said Gaffney, "What's going on in conservative circles should give everyone real cause for concern. What it bespeaks is an effort to penetrate and influence conservatives, who are the most likely and perhaps only community in America who will stand up to and ultimately help ensure the defeat of this seditious totalitarian political program."
Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on December 6, 2010 - 3:45pm
Americans for Tax Reform's Gover Norquist tells The Harvard Crimson that he is the epitome of a "moderate Republican" and that there really is no such thing as being "too conservative" ... oh, and that he wants to shrink the government until it is back to "where we were at the turn of the century":
FM: You are known for saying that you want government to be “the size where we can drown it in the bathtub.” Can you elaborate on this?
GGN: I want to drop the government in half over the next 25 years, and then drop it in half again. The government’s about 33 percent of GDP, 33 percent of the economy. We want to take it down to 16 and a half percent, then take it down to eight percent, all of which would take us to where we were at the turn of the century.
...
FM: Would you call any current Republican politicians too conservative?
GGN: Too conservative in the sense of not wanting to be radical enough? Sure. There are some who are dragging their feet in wanting to oppose spending. Too conservative meaning their vision of limited government has the government too teeny? I can’t think of any.
FM: Are there any moderate Republicans left?
GGN: I’m a moderate Republican. There are people who are extremes on either side of me, but I pretty much define a reasonable position on these things.
Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on November 17, 2010 - 4:02pm
For the last few days we have been noting the battle between the Religious Right and the gay conservative group GOProud set off by the latter's effort to get the Republican Party to ignore the social issues that are at the heard of the former's entire agenda.
This question is obviously going to be a significant one as the GOP prepares to take control of the House and sets out its agenda heading into 2012 ... which makes this announcement rather interesting:
Conservative activist Grover Norquist will quiz candidates running for Republican National Committee chairman at a debate to be held just two weeks before elections, he told Hotline On Call Wednesday.
Norquist, who runs Americans for Tax Reform, will moderate the Jan. 3 debate at the National Press Club. It's an effort, he says, to take the race for chairman beyond the 168 members of the national committee and to bolster transparency.
So I wonder how the Religious Right feels about the next RNC chair being vetted by someone like Norquist who clearly does not care about their social issues agenda and, presumably, has no interest in including such questions in the debate process.
Submitted by Miranda Blue on November 11, 2010 - 2:53pm
Following last Tuesday's election, RWW will bring you our list of the "The Ten Scariest Republicans Heading to Congress." Our sixth candidate profile is on Lou Barletta, America’s anti-immigrant mayor:
Those disappointed to see anti-immigrant zealot Tom Tancredo off the national political stage will find a similar one-issue firebrand in Pennsylvania congressman-elect Lou Barletta.
Barletta rose to national prominence as the mayor of Hazleton, Pennsylvania, a small working class city that in 2006 enacted some of the most draconian anti-immigrant measures in the country. Hazleton’s law put tough penalties on individuals and businesses who knowingly or unknowingly did business with undocumented immigrants—it revoked for five years the business license of any business caught employing an undocumented immigrant, and slapped landlords renting to undocumented immigrants with a $1,000-a-day fine. The law also declared English the official language of Hazleton, and prohibited city officials from translating documents without permission.
When the law passed, Barletta told the Washington Post, “I will get rid of the illegal people. It's this simple: They must leave." On the day the city passed the measure, Barletta wore a bulletproof vest to illustrate his concern over crimes he said were being committed by undocumented immigrants. Statistics, however, showed that undocumented immigrants were hardly responsible for a crime wave in Hazelton: the city’s data showed that of 8,575 felonies committed in the city between 2000 and 2007, 20 had been linked to undocumented immigrants. Later, forced to admit that he had no proof of an illegal immigrant-caused crime wave, or proof that illegal immigrants were crowding Hazleton’s schools and hospitals, or even any idea how many illegal immigrants were in Hazelton, Barletta responded, “The people in my city don’t need numbers.”
After the law took effect, businesses catering to Latino residents that had revitalized Hazleton’s downtown area saw a sharp drop in business, and Latino residents reported increased hostility from white residents.
A federal judge struck down Barletta’s law in 2007, writing, "The genius of our Constitution is that it provides rights even to those who evoke the least sympathy from the general public. Hazleton, in its zeal to control the presence of a group deemed undesirable, violated the rights of such people, as well as others within the community." An appeals court this year upheld the ruling.
Although Barletta claimed to be defending “the legal taxpayer of any race,” he admitted that he found inspiration for the law from the website of self-described “proud nationalist” Jim Turner, who pushed a similar measure in San Bernardino, California to prevent the state from becoming, as he put it, a “Third World Cesspool.”
As copy-cat laws started to pop up in towns around the country, Barletta became a hero to anti-immigrant and nativist groups. When he ran for Congress in 2008, Barletta’s campaign received $10,920 from the Minuteman PAC, the political spending arm of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, a vigilante border-patrol group that the Southern Poverty Law Center calls “nativist extremist.” It was the largest donation the Minuteman PAC made to a candidate that year.
In 2009, Barletta drew fire for speaking at a conference hosted by The American Cause, a group that had earlier that year released a report urging the Republican Party to not “pander to pro-amnesty Hispanics and swing voters,” and instead to put anti-immigrant policies at the forefront of the party’s strategy. The report was authored by several anti-immigrant advocates, many who had clear records of dabbling in white supremacy. The executive director of the group, and main author of the report, had even been charged with a hate crime against an African American woman. The immigrants’ rights group America’s Voice described the 2009 conference as “a forum for white nationalists to forge ties with ‘mainstream’ media commentators and conservative leaders.”
Although Barletta frames most of his politics through the lens of illegal immigration, he has also embraced Tea Party talking points on social issues, the environment, and the scope of government. In a candidates’ debate, he said his first action as a member of Congress would be to vote to repeal health care reform. He says the Affordable Care Act brought about “nationalized health care” and said it would put “life-affecting health decisions in the hands of bureaucrats,” and echoed the false claim raised by many in the Tea Party that health care reform “will take $500 billion out of Medicare." He told a forum in Pocono, "We're afraid of our government. We're afraid of what our government is going to do” and claimed on his campaign website that President Obama and Democrats in Congress are “spending our country into servitude.”
In terms of government spending, Barletta took particular issue with the comparatively miniscule $1.1 million that was spent to send members of Congress and their staffers to last year’s climate summit in Copenhagen. He claims to be a climate change skeptic, saying, “You know there's arguments on both sides. I'm not convinced that there's scientific evidence that proves that. I believe there's some that can also argue the opposite.”
When Obama created a panel to distribute recovery funds from BP’s $20 billion escrow account after the Gulf oil spill, Barletta said, “It’s exactly what the people of the Gulf don’t need – more bureaucracy.”
Barletta’s record as mayor of Hazleton doesn’t speak well, however, for his future as a fiscal problem solver: his budget for Hazleton last year hikes taxes and fees, and called for laying off government workers—including a number of police officers. As Barletta leaves office, Hazleton has the highest rate of unemployment in Pennsylvania. Despite raising taxes as Mayor of Hazleton, Barletta has signed Americans for Tax Reform’s pledge to never raise taxes in Washington.
Barletta opposes marriage equality, Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell repeal, and abortion rights. He has also embraced right-wing conspiracy theories about government-run “death panels” and the imminent risk of human cloning, stating on his website, “I will oppose the efforts of some to increase or expand the protection or establishment of legal euthanasia, abortion, and human cloning. As Congress begins to tackle the issues of Medicare and health care reform, I will never support a program that results in rationing of life-saving procedures to those covered under those programs.”
In his predictably hostile response to the planned Islamic community center in lower Manhattan, he advanced the popular right-wing pseudo-historical theory of Muslim “victory mosques.”
While Barletta, it seems, will be a reliable vote for the Republican Party’s far-right wing, he’s already emerging as a leader on anti-immigrant zealotry. Two days after the election, he went on Fox News to accuse Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of attempting to buy Hispanic votes by introducing the DREAM Act. Watch:
We’re delighted to announce the debut of our ongoing “Americans For Truth Academy,” designed to train young people (as well as older pro-family advocates) how to answer “gay” activist misinformation and fight the homosexual-bisexual-transsexual agenda. Below is a flier with the basic information. Please consider sponsoring a student to attend for $99 or attending yourself. Rarely will you get a chance to learn from such brilliant teachers on the homosexual issue all in one rigorous seminar.
This August 5-7, AFTAH will bring together some of the country’s leading pro-family experts on homosexuality to teach both young and old how to answer the lies and myths that so readily emanate from the “GLBT” (“gay”) camp. I am very excited about this new project’s potential to reverse years of pro-”gay” brainwashing in the schools and popular culture — corrupting the hearts and minds of our young people.
Let’s face it: much of the conservative establishment has dropped the ball on fighting the homosexual agenda (or given up entirely), so AFTAH is stepping up to train a new generations of activists to contend with the sexual sin movement that has fooled so many Americans into treating a human wrong — changeable same-sex behavior — as a “civil right.”
...
August 5-7, 2010
AFTAH headquarters in Carol Stream, Illinois, outside Chicago
This is a rigorous, 3-day program featuring some of the leading pro-family experts on homosexuality in the Culture War. Prospective attendees will need to be approved with references; this is not open to pro-homosexual activists but only to those who share AFTAH’s belief that homosexuality is immoral and that the GLBT movement is destructive to America and a direct threat to our religious freedom.
Cost: Students 14-25: $99; Adults: $199
Limited Seating Available
Youth Scholarships: we will be soliciting donations with the goal of covering the cost of attending the AFTAH Academy for as many students as possible. If you would like to sponsor a student for the Academy, send your tax-deductible gift of $99 or more to AFTAH at the address below or online at www.americansfortruth.com/donate .
Tentative List of Instructors:
Robert Knight, Coral Ridge Ministries
Peter LaBarbera, Americans For Truth About Homosexuality
Ryan Sorba, Young Conservatives of California
Prof. Robert Gagnon, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary
Prof. Rena Lindevaldsen, Liberty University Law School
Matt Barber, Liberty Counsel
Laurie Higgins, Illinois Family Institute
Greg Quinlan, Parents and Friends of Gays and Ex-Gays
To reserve a place in the AFTAH Academy, send us your references or those for your child. For more information, write: americansfortruth@gmail.com or call 630-717-7631.
