Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
The above statement, attributed to Lord Acton (1834-1902) attests to the influence of circumstances on human behavior, and is validated by our experience.
Countless enterprises which began with the best of intentions, have been warped and diverted by success. The temptations of power are very hard to resist.
There is no reason to believe that the Council on American-Islamic Relations was conceived with any intention by its founders to not fulfill its mission, or to deceive donors. But in time, with growing success and influence, the largest American Muslim civil rights organization did indeed stray from its mission, and attempted to hide this from donors.
After years of CAIR supporters giving the organization the benefit of the doubt with respect to occasional rumors and allegations of improprieties, NPR journalist Leila Fadel wrote a carefully edited expose of CAIR which was published on April 15, 2021.
As we at Reform CAIR have noted in post after post after post, Fadel’s article was many months in the making, and CAIR had more than enough time to realize it needed to come clean and agree to a proper investigation of the allegations, in such a manner that no one need fear retaliation.
Instead, on April 16, the day after Fadel’s article was published, CAIR sent supporters a four-page letter which was more or less a blanket denial of the allegations. That same letter also claimed that CAIR had initiated an investigation of the allegations but thus far no former employees or board members had come forward to participate.
Five weeks later, in a clear message to anyone still considering coming forward, it retaliated with a lawsuit against a former senior employee turned whistleblower, who had publicly exposed a number of instances of sexual misconduct and harassment, gender and religious discrimination, financial mismanagement including secret foreign funding, and a general lack of accountability at CAIR.
The problem with CAIR’s lawsuit from the beginning was that the whistleblower was not disclosing any information that CAIR was entitled to expect to keep protected. When she stated publicly that Nihad Awad alone knew the identities of large foreign donors, this was not a trade secret, or at least not a legitimate one, but malfeasance.
When the whistleblower complained that CAIR had failed to investigate and then covered up an allegation by a former secret wife of a prominent chapter leader, she was not revealing a trade secret, but a blatant instance of CAIR tolerating sexual misconduct.
When the same whistleblower claimed that Nihad Awad had acted inappropriately toward her at a CAIR event, in a stairway, and at midnight in a hotel lobby, she was not exposing trade secrets, but sexual harassment.
And prior to these public allegations, when this same employee told Nihad Awad that enough was enough and she intended to resign, he cautioned her that CAIR “is a very powerful organization”.
Well, with the recent dismissal “with prejudice” of its lawsuit against this former employee, CAIR has demonstrated that its power is no match for the truth.
CAIR is in crisis. For too long it has tried to ignore the allegations against it, and keep its donors and the Muslim community believing it is their only defense against Islamophobia. But when the truth finally comes out, it will probably only add to the general public’s growing, if under-informed, concern about Muslims. The sooner CAIR comes clean, the better for the Muslim community.
And for the many victims of CAIR representatives especially, justice is yet to be done.
Following is a statement on behalf of Lori Saroya and her legal team on CAIR’s withdrawal of its lawsuit with prejudice. (See also: https://www.facebook.com/lorihaidri/posts/10159865963740786)
Council on American-Islamic Relations Drops Suit Against Former Board Member Who Spoke Out On Sexual Harassment, Discrimination and Retaliation
January 7, 2022 – The Council on American-Islamic Relations, a powerful lobbying and advocacy organization which describes itself as a civil rights organization representing Muslim-Americans, has today decided to drop the federal lawsuit it filed in May 2021 in the United States District Court in Minneapolis against its own former national Board member and employee. CAIR had accused defendant Lori Saroya, a nationally-respected civil rights advocate on behalf of Muslims, of defamation for statements she made about evidence that the organization had engaged in sexual harassment and discrimination and that it had deceived the public and donors about its fundraising practices. This afternoon, CAIR notified the Court and Ms. Saroya that it was dismissing all of its claims against her “with prejudice.”
As stated in public filings in the case, Ms. Saroya, who had founded the Minnesota chapter of CAIR before being asked by CAIR to serve on its national board in 2015, resigned from CAIR in May 2018 after the organization’s Executive Director displayed unwelcome and inappropriate conduct toward her. She is among a growing chorus of former CAIR personnel and other Muslim-Americans around the country who have spoken out about the conduct they’ve experienced and witnessed at CAIR. CAIR also sought a Court order prohibiting Ms. Saroya from speaking out about her concerns about sexual harassment, discrimination and fundraising practices at CAIR, and alleged that she had breached the confidentiality agreement that it required her to sign when she commenced her employment with CAIR.
Ms. Saroya filed a lengthy response to this lawsuit which included exhibits, placing on the public record the evidence supporting each of the statements that she had made. In response to today’s dismissal, Ms. Saroya said: “The reason I have refused to accede to CAIR’s demand that I stay silent and that I have defended myself against this retaliatory lawsuit is this: I wanted to send a strong message that women will not be silenced. Those of us who have spoken up about CAIR intend to continue to do so, more vigorously than ever. Indeed, CAIR’s unsuccessful lawsuit has inspired me, and others like me, to do more to amplify the voices of victims of sexual abuse, gender discrimination and sexual harassment within the CAIR network, and to help them get the justice, the accountability, and the healing that those victims deserve.”
CAIR’s withdrawal of its lawsuit against Ms. Saroya comes while her motions for Court orders requiring the organization to turn over documents and other evidence that it had been withholding were pending before the Court. CAIR’s decision to drop its case comes before any of the sworn depositions of its officers and Board members about the subject matter of Ms. Saroya’s statements had taken place.
“First and foremost, this is a victory for Ms. Saroya and those who, like her, have had the historic courage to challenge a powerful organization over issues of sexual harassment, sexual discrimination and retaliatory conduct. It sends a message that voices like that of Ms. Saroya can’t easily be silenced, as CAIR obviously hoped to silence Ms. Saroya here. And it is a victory for the First Amendment, which exists precisely to protect all Americans against heavy-handed attempts to stifle criticism,” said Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr attorney Jeff Robbins, who led Ms. Saroya’s legal team.
Ms. Saroya’s legal defense team was led by attorneys Jeff Robbins, Alain Baudry, Steven Kerbaugh, Joseph Lipchitz and Kelsey Marron of the national law firm Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr. Mr. Robbins, Mr. Lipchitz and Ms. Marron practice in the Firm’s Boston office; Messrs. Baudry and Kerbaugh practice in the Firm’s Minneapolis, Minnesota office.
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