Alana Goodman of the Washington Free Beacon reports that three Democrats–Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL), and Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA)–had invited a “representative of a human rights group headed by a designated al Qaeda terrorist” to brief them on U.S. drone policy late last year.
The group, Al Karama, was founded and is currently headed by Abdul Rahman Naimi, who was added to the U.S. Treasury’s list of terrorists and Al Qaeda supporters in December, according to Goodman. Other Al Karama officials have suspected terror ties. Mohammad Al Ahmady, the official who was to have briefed the Democrats in question, was denied a visa by the State Department for unspecified reasons, though he blamed President Barack Obama directly: “I curse Obama and the traders of wars,” he said in a statement to the Free Beacon.
All three Democrats who were to have been briefed have a record of left-wing activism on the war on terror. Rep. Schakowsky, against whom the author ran in 2010, touts herself as a supporter of Israel, yet frequently associates with those hostile to Israel, including Al Karama and former Honduran president Manuel Zelaya.