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Gingrich Refuses To Endorse Frank Gaffney’s Claim That Conservatives Are Being Infiltrated By ‘Islamists’

Last month, the right’s chief Islamophobic fearmonger Frank Gaffney charged that the conservative movement and the American Conservative Union — which is putting on the Conservative Political Action Conference currently taking place in Washington, DC — has been infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood and “Islamists.” Gaffney accused CPAC organizers of “enabling a political influence operation to advance the causes of radical Islamists.” “I had a confidential meeting with some senior conservative leaders to warn them about an influence operation against the conservative movement,” he said.

Today at CPAC, Newt Gingrich hosted a screening of “America At Risk,” a fearmongering film produced by Citizens United about the “threat” of Sharia Law and Islamic extremism. Gaffney plays a prominent role in the film, and at one point, said that Muslims are using their “oil wealth” to spread Sharia “worldwide.”

Given Gaffney’s prominence in “America At Risk,” which both Gingrich and his wife Callista narrate, ThinkProgress asked Gingrich if he agrees with Gaffney’s theory that Islamic extremists are infiltrating the conservative movement. However, Gingrich refused to answer when asked on three separate occasions:

TP: Mr. Speaker, do you think the conservative movement is being infultrated by the Islamists? […]

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Can I ask you about Frank Gaffney real quick? […]

Do you think that the conservative movement is being infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood?

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Of course, Gingrich has been a serial Muslim fearmonger. He called supporters of the Islamic community center near Ground Zero in New York City “hostile to our civilization” and — in the context of states’ banning the non-existent threat of Sharia law — recently called for a federal law that “clearly and unequivocally states that we’re not going to tolerate any imported law.” A fearful Gingrich even said — without any evidence whatsoever — that if secular Egyptian political figure Mohamed ElBaradei “ends up being the head” of the Egyptian transitional government after a successful revolution, he “[w]ould be rapidly absorbed by the Muslim Brotherhood.”