By Mark Tapscott
Political correctness in the federal government protected radical Islamic terrorist Omar Mateen in at least five ways during the months leading up to his deadly assault on a gay nightclub in Orlando, according to a national security expert.
“The fact is that the FBI did recognize Omar Mateen, twice in fact, but as a matter of official policy under the Obama administration’s politically correct ‘countering violent extremism’ policies, the institutional rules of our national security agencies as a matter of intentional design ensure that investigative clues are obscured,” Patrick Poole told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Poole is co-founder of Unconstrained Analytics, non-profit group dedicated to analyzing “evidence unconstrained by preconceptions and biases” concerning international terrorism. He has been a guest lecturer on counter-terrorism issues at the U.S. Army War College and a speaker at the Army Provost Marshal’s annual Anti-Terrorism/Force Protection conference.
- PC blinds homeland defenders: Among the most controversial of the five factors Poole cited was a 2011 decision by FBI officials to remove from its counter-terrorism training materials references to all terms found objectionable by a team of Muslim experts retained by the Department of Justice. Despite congressional protests, the material was never restored.
As a result, “violent extremist” effectively became the official federal designation for individuals like Mateen, San Bernadino attackers Tashfeen Malik and Syed Rizwan Farook, Boston Marathon bombers Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev, and Fort Hood killer Nidal Malik Hasan, despite their shared devotion to radical Islamic movements, including ISIS and al Qaeda.
- PC perverts religious tolerance: The FBI’s head-in-the-sand approach is also seen in a recently completed Department of Homeland Security report that directs federal officials there “not to use any language that might be ‘disrespectful’ to Muslims, including (but not limited to) the words ‘jihad,’ ‘sharia’ and ‘takfir.’” Poole said the policies recommended by the report are in effect throughout the federal government.
Among the federal agencies in DHS are the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency, U.S. Secret Service, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, U.S. Coast Guard and the Transportation Security Administration.
- PC discourages witnesses: The refusal of federal officials to describe terrorist attacks by radical Islamic terrorists accurately also discourages citizens with important information that might prevent deaths and injuries from telling authorities what they know before it’s too late, according to Poole.
The refusal turns “suspicion around on anyone who recognizes the warning signs. When Mateen’s coworkers expressed concern about his extremist statements, the FBI dropped the case because they believed the coworkers, not the future killer, were the problem. The coworkers were deemed racist Islamophobes by the FBI, and Mateen’s behavior and statements were excused,” he told TheDCNF.
“We now have two terrorism cases with dead Americans six months apart, namely San Bernardino and Orlando, where potential witnesses did not report suspicious activity because they were afraid of being called racists and bigots,” Poole added.
- PC gives cover to terrorist allies: Too often “dialogue” between federal officials and Muslim advocacy groups make it possible for organizations with confirmed terrorist links to influence government policy. Poole pointed to multiple meetings between Department of Justice officials and representatives of the Council for American-Islamic Relations in 2012.
Poole noted that “the FBI and DOJ responded by officially cutting ties with CAIR, but these same agencies regularly disregarded their own rules about engaging these extremist groups with a wink and a nod by the White House.”
- PC hamstrings Congress: Poole pointed to controversial hearings convened in 2011 by Rep. Peter King, the New York Republican, focused radical Islamization among young American Muslims. King was subjected to relentless and often savage criticism in the media, often based on comments from individuals and groups with links to terrorist ties.
“The politicians on the Hill and elsewhere saw exactly what happened to Peter King when he tried to tackle this issue head-on,” Poole told TheDCNF, adding that “these counter-terrorism failures will continue to occur” as long as long as Congress avoids taking decisive budget and legislative actions to end PC-based policies.