NEW YORK – As the House of Representatives prepared to vote on H.R. 9495, the Stop Terror-Financing and Tax Penalties on American Hostages Act, T’ruah, a rabbinic human rights organization, urged members to vote against the bill, which the organization argued would make it too easy for President-elect Trump to target non-profit organizations.
Rabbi Jill Jacobs, CEO of T’ruah, said:
“T’ruah is deeply concerned about H.R. 9495, which would give the Secretary of the Treasury the ability to unilaterally designate any U.S. nonprofit as a ‘terrorist-supporting organization’ and to strip the organization of tax-exempt status. As a president who has already signaled his intention to punish political enemies prepares to assume power, this bill creates a mechanism for shutting down any nonprofit whose agenda the administration opposes without due process. This is a threat to the constitution and to the foundations of civil society, and will have a chilling effect on free speech.
“This bill claims to be designed to stop organizations promoting terrorism, but we already have a process for identifying and reviewing these concerns under Article 18 Section 2339 of the U.S. Code. The existing process is far less susceptible to the political whims of the executive.
“Our Jewish tradition offers us significant caution about leaders who assume too much power for themselves — from the biblical cautions about appointing a king to our people’s often tragic experiences of living under brutal sovereigns. We know that the system of checks and balances fundamental to American democracy is necessary to keep all of us safe.
“Civil society is essential to democracy. It’s no surprise then that autocratic leaders often target civil society as one of their first orders of business. We have seen this already in Israel, where Prime Minister Netanyahu has engaged in a decades-long campaign to weaken NGOs both through legal and political means. And we have seen other autocratic leaders, from Putin to Orban, prioritize shutting down civil society. Trump has made his intentions to consolidate power and punish his enemies very clear. We cannot allow this bill to pass.”
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About T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights
T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights brings the Torah’s ideals of human dignity, equality, and justice to life by empowering our network of over 2,300 rabbis and cantors to be moral voices and to lead Jewish communities in advancing democracy and human rights for all people in the United States, Israel, and the occupied Palestinian territories.