Texas Governor-elect Gina Hinojosa has told The Washington Post that she will remove the state's terrorist designation of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), reversing one of outgoing Governor Greg Abbott's most contested public-safety moves before she has even taken office. The pledge came in a Washington Post interview published on Saturday, November 14, 2026, and was reported across Texas and national outlets on Sunday.

Source: The Washington Post interview, via Profilo Politics

Asked about the use of public-safety powers against the country's largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, Hinojosa said: "We have to use public safety measures for public safety," dismissing what she called "nonsense happening with power that should be used for public safety, money that should use for public safety, that is not being used for safety." For now the pledge changes nothing on the ground: the designation remains in force, Hinojosa has given no date for acting, and she cannot act until she is sworn in on January 19, 2027.

The designation is not just a label. It bars CAIR from buying or acquiring land in Texas, exposes the group to state organized-crime charges under a 2023 Texas law, and was followed by Abbott asking the U.S. Treasury to strip the group's tax-exempt status and asking Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton to strip its nonprofit status. Removing it would lift the state's most severe official branding of a Muslim civil rights organization — a step with direct consequences for Muslim communities in Houston, Dallas-Fort Worth, Austin and San Antonio, and for the housing and community projects the designation has frozen.

How the designation was imposed

Abbott imposed the designation by proclamation on November 18, 2025, using powers from Senate Bill 1900, a 2023 law that gave Texas its own authority to name foreign terrorist organizations. SB 1900 passed the Texas House 93-51 on May 22, 2023 — Hinojosa, then a state representative, voted no — and Abbott signed it on June 9, 2023. A second law, House Bill 4211, passed the House 104-41 on May 8, 2025, again with Hinojosa voting no, and was signed on June 20, 2025. The November 2025 proclamation named both CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood as foreign terrorist organizations and transnational criminal organizations.

Source: The Media Line via SRN News

Abbott then pressed further. On December 2, 2025, he wrote to U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent urging an investigation of CAIR and the suspension of its tax-exempt status, and on January 28, 2026, he wrote to Paxton demanding the attorney general use every available tool to strip CAIR of its nonprofit status and stop it operating in Texas. At the federal level, President Donald Trump signed an executive order on November 24, 2025, starting the federal designation process for Muslim Brotherhood chapters in Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon. CAIR itself has never been designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. federal government.

Nov 18, 2025Abbott proclamation designates CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood in Texas
93-51Texas House vote on SB 1900 (2023), the law behind the designation
Jan 19, 2027Hinojosa takes office — the earliest she can act on the pledge
19-12Republican majority she will face in the Texas Senate

CAIR's answer: denial and a federal lawsuit

CAIR says it unequivocally condemns all acts of terrorism and denies any links to terrorist groups. On November 20, 2025, its Dallas-Fort Worth and Austin chapters sued Abbott and Paxton in federal court in Austin — CAIR Texas Dallas Fort Worth v. Abbott, No. 1:25-cv-01878 — arguing the designation violated federal law; the case is still pending. Separately, Attorney General Paxton filed a lawsuit on February 5, 2026, in Collin County seeking to stop the Muslim Brotherhood, CAIR and its Austin, Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth chapters from operating in Texas, according to court records reported by Texas outlets. A governor's rescission would end the state executive finding going forward, but it would not by itself end either lawsuit.

The group's history is contested ground, and both sides cite it. Federal prosecutors once named CAIR an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terrorism-financing trial, in which five leaders were convicted in 2008, and the FBI suspended formal outreach to CAIR that year — but CAIR itself was never charged. Texas is also not the only state to act: Florida designated CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood under a new law, a federal judge in Florida, Allen C. Winsor, refused to block that designation, and CAIR suspended its Florida operations in early November 2026 while it appeals.

What is solid

  • Hinojosa told The Washington Post she will remove CAIR's Texas terrorist designation; the interview was published November 14, 2026.
  • Abbott designated CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood by proclamation on November 18, 2025; the designation bars land purchases in Texas.
  • CAIR's Texas chapters are challenging the designation in federal court in Austin (No. 1:25-cv-01878); the case is pending.
  • The U.S. federal government has never designated CAIR a terrorist organization.

What is only claimed

  • Critics, including Abbott's campaign, say CAIR has extremist ties and point to its political arm's support for Hinojosa; CAIR denies any terror links and says it condemns all terrorism.
  • Reporting on the pledge focuses on CAIR; it does not clearly establish that Hinojosa also pledged to remove the Muslim Brotherhood's designation.

The political fight around the pledge

The criticism began before the election and resumed immediately. CAIR's political arm, CAIR Action, rated Hinojosa "PREFERRED" for governor in its 2026 Texas voter guide, and Abbott's campaign seized on it on October 20, 2026, in a release headlined "Foreign Terrorist Organization Supports Gina Hinojosa's Campaign." Nine days before the election, Abbott said on Fox News' The Sunday Briefing: "Gina supports that endorsement that she got from them because she supports Sharia law, she supports Sharia communities," adding that he was focused on making sure "we ban Sharia law, Sharia cities, Sharia compounds." Hinojosa, a practicing Catholic, had not publicly answered that charge by that Sunday night. The attack did not decide the race: on November 3, she defeated Abbott by more than seven points.

Hinojosa will be Texas' first Latina governor and the first Democrat to win the office since Ann Richards in 1990. In the same Washington Post interview she vowed to trade the culture wars for moderation, saying: "Trump and I won the same border communities: I won them this time, he won them last time." She takes office on January 19, 2027, after naming a bipartisan transition team on November 5 led by former Republican state Rep. Ernest Bailes and labor leader Ryan Pollock — but she will govern with a Texas Senate where Republicans still hold a 19-12 majority.

What happens next

The designation stays in force until Hinojosa acts, and she has not said on which day she will move. The first test of the promise will come in her opening days in office, with the Republicans who spent the campaign warning she would side with the group watching for the moment she does it. In the meantime the Austin federal lawsuit continues, Paxton's Collin County case continues, and Texas Muslim organizations — including communities in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, where CAIR's Texas chapter has been at the centre of the fight — remain under a designation that blocks land purchases and hangs over community and housing projects. For Texas readers, including the state's large immigrant communities, the practical question is narrow and concrete: whether a civil rights organization's legal status changes on January 19, 2027, or whether the pledge becomes the new governor's first drawn-out fight.

Source: Context Corner, reporting the Washington Post interview