Rep. Roy Leads Hearing Highlighting the Threat of Sharia Law in the United States

Washington, D.C. - Today, Congressman Chip Roy (R-TX-21) led a House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government hearing titled, "Sharia-Free America: Why Political Islam & Sharia Law Are Incompatible with the U.S. Constitution."

The hearing exposed efforts to establish alternative, Sharia law-based legal and civic institutions, how these alternative institutions are contrary to America's founding principles, and how they may violate federal law and the Constitution.

Witnesses included: Stephen Gelé, Partner, Bivalacqua, Gelé, and Ellis and Chairman of the Board, Pelican Institute for Public Policy; Robert Spencer, Shillman Fellow, David Horowitz Freedom Center; Krista Schild, RAIR Foundation USA, and Ilya Somin, Professor of Law, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University.

Watch the full committee hearing here.

Excerpts from Rep. Roy's Opening Remarks:

"The principles of Sharia are at odds with the Constitution and the laws of the United States. Sharia fails to include due process, treats non-Muslims as second class citizens and prescribes barbaric punishments, all the while, polygamy, misguided corporal punishment for perceived violations of Islam and acts of violence and terrorism on behalf of Sharia are permitted by its adherents. Sharia encourages violence, silences dissent, rejects religious freedom and subjugates women and children. Let's be clear, this is not about having the freedom of worshiping a religion of one's choosing, such as Islam, but forcing a foreign legal code that is incompatible with our laws and legal system that provides unwanted consequences to the American people. It's everything we've fought against for more than 250 years.

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"If Texas falls, so does the nation. These efforts to undermine the Constitution and demonstrate political Islam have only been worsened by an unchecked immigration system that admitted Sharia adherence into our borders. Europe gives us a clear example of what will happen if we don't close the door on Sharia now. In England and Wales, more than 85 Sharia courts operate as a parallel Islamic government, depriving women of the rights they are entitled to under British law…You might think the Sharia crisis is only in foreign countries or has not yet arrived in the United States, but it is here…Now is the time to take decisive action, as our Founders did when confronted with the same issues today, our nation is founded on these ideas. Sharia law shares none of these principles by its Arabic definition: It is a law, one pushed in our country for too long. It has no place in American government, not now or ever."