Florida brands the Brotherhood and CAIR terrorist groups; only CAIR shows up in court

Governor Ron DeSantis and the Florida Cabinet voted on Tuesday 29 September to designate Antifa, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the Council on American-Islamic Relations together with CAIR-Florida as domestic terrorist organizations under state law, and in the same vote adopted the existing federal list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations into Florida statute. Outlets disagree on the size of that second tranche — Florida Phoenix reported “more than 90” federally designated groups, flvoicenews “more than 100” — and the figure is not settled without the Florida Department of Law Enforcement’s written designation notice, which this desk has not seen. The vehicle is House Bill 1471, signed in April and effective 1 July, which routes designation recommendations through the state’s head of domestic security. Attorney General James Uthmeier, in a video posted to X, said: “Today, Florida drew a line on terrorism… We will name these groups, cut off the money, and hold those who bankroll them accountable.” Outgoing FDLE Commissioner Mark Glass made the recommendation at what The Center Square described as his final scheduled Cabinet meeting.

The litigation moved faster than the designation. CAIR and CAIR-Florida had sued on 1 July, the day HB 1471 took effect; Florida officials paused the planned designation in mid-July. On 1 October the court dismissed that first case, holding the nonprofits had lacked standing in July because their fears of harm were speculative. Counsel — the ACLU, the ACLU of Florida, the Southern Poverty Law Center, Akeel & Valentine and Bondurant Mixson & Elmore — filed a new complaint hours later, and on Friday 2 October asked for emergency relief, telling the court the groups' civil rights work is in “imminent danger.” The complaint argues the regime “transforms Florida’s Governor, Chief of Domestic Security, and Cabinet into judge, jury, and nonprofit executioner.” Hina Shamsi of the ACLU National Security Project said the plaintiffs seek “urgent judicial intervention to prevent CAIR and CAIR-Florida from becoming the first casualties of Florida’s unconstitutional and draconian new law.”

The federal backdrop matters for the pleading. Executive Order 14362, signed in November 2025, covered “certain Muslim Brotherhood chapters”; the State Department and Treasury followed on 13–14 January 2026 with designations of the Egyptian, Lebanese and Jordanian chapters. Washington designated chapters. Florida designated “the Muslim Brotherhood” as such — and that gap is the substance of CAIR’s federal preemption count, the claim with the longest reach beyond Florida and the least coverage. Texas, where Governor Greg Abbott designated the Brotherhood and CAIR in November 2025, is exposed to the same argument; Florida is the second state, not the first. Separately, the Northern District of Florida granted CAIR a preliminary injunction in March 2026 against DeSantis’s 2025 executive order; the state’s appeal to the Eleventh Circuit remains live and its posture is unestablished.

Assessment: Three things to hold at arm’s length. First, the count: any tile that says “over 100 organizations” is folding the pre-existing federal FTO list into a state action, and the defensible framing is three new designations plus an adopted federal list. Second, the effective date: a 5 November start circulated via one aggregator in truncated form and is uncorroborated, yet it sets the clock on the emergency motion. Third, the asymmetry. The court will hear from CAIR’s five law firms and from nobody on behalf of the Brotherhood, because the designated entity has no US corporate existence to appear with. A designation that cannot be contested by its named subject is tested only by its collateral damage — which is what makes the preemption count, not the First Amendment count, the one to watch.