The Muslim Association of Canada is crying “Islamophobia” and demanding “fair and balanced” coverage after a report exposed alleged links between Canadian organizations and the Muslim Brotherhood, but the organization’s response leaves out inconvenient details from the Canadian government’s own years-long investigation, including roughly one million financial transactions, more than 415,000 emails and court challenges that MAC ultimately lost.
The Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP) released a report this week examining what researchers described as a network of Muslim Brotherhood-aligned organizations that have established influence in Canadian politics, charities, civil society and higher education.
Among the organizations examined was the Muslim Association of Canada (MAC).
Following publication of The Post Millennial’s report, a communications representative providing MAC’s response demanded that the article represent “both sides of the story.” The representative stipulated that MAC’s statement could only be published “in full, exactly as written, without edits, excerpts, or paraphrasing,” not at the bottom of the article and only alongside references to MAC to provide a “fair and balanced perspective.”
So MAC’s response appears here, in full, unedited and exactly where its representative demanded.
The Muslim Association of Canada stated: "The ISGAP report is nothing more than recycled Islamophobic tropes dressed up as research. It is a biased, unsubstantiated hit piece that relies on discredited allegations that were themselves challenged by the Ontario Superior Court for their apparent bias. The CRA audit has been completed. Preliminary questions raised around any links to the Muslim Brotherhood were dismissed from the CRA’s final conclusion. MAC is a solely independent Canadian organization. The ISGAP report amplifies narratives designed to fuel Islamophobia and sow division within Canadian society."
There’s a problem with MAC’s response: the court record it cites doesn’t say that.
An Ontario Superior Court judge did raise concerns about portions of the Canada Revenue Agency’s preliminary analysis and said he was sympathetic to some, but not all, of MAC’s arguments. But the court did not rule that the CRA investigation was Islamophobic, did not find that the underlying Muslim Brotherhood evidence was false, and did not vindicate MAC. Instead, Justice Markus Koehnen dismissed MAC’s application challenging the CRA audit as premature because the agency’s administrative process was not yet complete.
MAC appealed. It lost again.
In July 2024, the Ontario Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal, concluding that the CRA process remained preliminary when MAC filed its challenge and that there was not yet a completed factual record upon which to adjudicate MAC’s Charter claims. Neither court ruled that the evidence concerning alleged Muslim Brotherhood connections was false.
There’s another problem with calling ISGAP’s report an “unsubstantiated hit piece”: much of the underlying evidence came from the Canadian government.
The CRA began auditing MAC in 2015. According to the Ontario Court of Appeal, investigators conducted dozens of interviews and visits to MAC properties while examining approximately one million financial transactions, more than 415,000 emails and more than 63,000 other files.
In 2021, the CRA issued a roughly 150-page Administrative Fairness Letter detailing numerous preliminary allegations of noncompliance with Canadian tax law. At that stage, the agency recommended revoking MAC’s charitable status.
This was not ISGAP digging through social media looking for connections. It was a years-long Canadian government investigation examining an enormous volume of MAC’s own records. And one of the issues investigators examined was MAC’s relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood.
A subsequent study by George Washington University’s Program on Extremism analyzed the CRA records released through MAC’s litigation. Researchers Lorenzo Vidino and Sergio Altuna reported that investigators examined whether MAC was advancing an “unstated non-charitable collateral purpose”—advancing the Muslim Brotherhood as an organization.
According to the researchers, the CRA examined evidence involving MAC leaders and the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, Canadian organizations supporting the Egyptian Brotherhood, and apparent membership transfers between MAC and Brotherhood organizations overseas.
The evidence also included MAC leaders allegedly holding senior positions connected to Egypt’s Freedom and Justice Party and the government of former Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, a Muslim Brotherhood leader.
Investigators examined MAC facilities allegedly being made available for Brotherhood-aligned activities and what the CRA viewed as members of Brotherhood organizations overseas being able to transfer their membership to MAC after moving to Canada.
The CRA itself questioned how an organization presenting itself as entirely Canadian could transfer memberships to and from foreign organizations.
MAC disputed the significance of that evidence, but disputing evidence is not the same as discrediting it. Additionally, another research group reached similar conclusions as ISGAP.
In 2025, George Washington University’s Program on Extremism published The Muslim Brotherhood in the West? Evidence from a Canadian Tax Authority Investigation, based on records released through MAC’s own litigation.
Researchers described MAC as a Muslim Brotherhood “legacy group” and wrote that MAC had acknowledged being founded by individuals linked to the Brotherhood and being inspired by the movement’s ideology.
The researchers highlighted what they described as communications and coordination between Brotherhood figures overseas and counterparts in Canada, along with apparent organizational membership transfers across borders.
That evidence predates ISGAP's new report.
MAC is correct that the CRA audit was eventually completed and that the agency backed away from its preliminary recommendation to revoke MAC’s charitable status. But MAC's response attempts to turn that into something much broader.
A regulator changing preliminary findings after receiving additional submissions is not the same thing as a court finding the underlying evidence false. No court made that finding.
The changing CRA record was part of the reason the Court of Appeal upheld dismissal of MAC’s challenge: MAC went to court before the administrative process had produced a final factual record.
So MAC can accurately say that preliminary Brotherhood questions did not become part of the CRA’s final conclusion.
What it cannot accurately say is that a court “discredited” the underlying evidence.
MAC also declares that it is a “solely independent Canadian organization.” But that's an answer to a different question. Being legally independent and Canadian does not determine whether an organization has historical, ideological, personnel or organizational relationships with a transnational movement. That was precisely what CRA investigators were examining.
According to GWU’s analysis of government records, investigators scrutinized connections involving MAC leaders, organizations supportive of the Egyptian Brotherhood, MAC facilities and apparent membership transfers involving Brotherhood organizations outside Canada.
MAC’s representative demanded that its response appear alongside references to the organization so readers could receive what he called a “fair and balanced perspective.”
MAC may want to dismiss the evidence as “Islamophobia.” But it cannot rewrite the record. The Brotherhood-related evidence wasn't invented by ISGAP, and no court declared it false. Much of it came from the Canadian government's own years-long investigation, and MAC's attempts to challenge that investigation in court failed.
Twice.
The Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism and Policy (ISGAP) released a report this week examining what researchers described as a network of Muslim Brotherhood-aligned organizations that have established influence in Canadian politics, charities, civil society and higher education.
Among the organizations examined was the Muslim Association of Canada (MAC).
Following publication of The Post Millennial’s report, a communications representative providing MAC’s response demanded that the article represent “both sides of the story.” The representative stipulated that MAC’s statement could only be published “in full, exactly as written, without edits, excerpts, or paraphrasing,” not at the bottom of the article and only alongside references to MAC to provide a “fair and balanced perspective.”
So MAC’s response appears here, in full, unedited and exactly where its representative demanded.
The Muslim Association of Canada stated: "The ISGAP report is nothing more than recycled Islamophobic tropes dressed up as research. It is a biased, unsubstantiated hit piece that relies on discredited allegations that were themselves challenged by the Ontario Superior Court for their apparent bias. The CRA audit has been completed. Preliminary questions raised around any links to the Muslim Brotherhood were dismissed from the CRA’s final conclusion. MAC is a solely independent Canadian organization. The ISGAP report amplifies narratives designed to fuel Islamophobia and sow division within Canadian society."
There’s a problem with MAC’s response: the court record it cites doesn’t say that.
An Ontario Superior Court judge did raise concerns about portions of the Canada Revenue Agency’s preliminary analysis and said he was sympathetic to some, but not all, of MAC’s arguments. But the court did not rule that the CRA investigation was Islamophobic, did not find that the underlying Muslim Brotherhood evidence was false, and did not vindicate MAC. Instead, Justice Markus Koehnen dismissed MAC’s application challenging the CRA audit as premature because the agency’s administrative process was not yet complete.
MAC appealed. It lost again.
In July 2024, the Ontario Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal, concluding that the CRA process remained preliminary when MAC filed its challenge and that there was not yet a completed factual record upon which to adjudicate MAC’s Charter claims. Neither court ruled that the evidence concerning alleged Muslim Brotherhood connections was false.
There’s another problem with calling ISGAP’s report an “unsubstantiated hit piece”: much of the underlying evidence came from the Canadian government.
The CRA began auditing MAC in 2015. According to the Ontario Court of Appeal, investigators conducted dozens of interviews and visits to MAC properties while examining approximately one million financial transactions, more than 415,000 emails and more than 63,000 other files.
In 2021, the CRA issued a roughly 150-page Administrative Fairness Letter detailing numerous preliminary allegations of noncompliance with Canadian tax law. At that stage, the agency recommended revoking MAC’s charitable status.
This was not ISGAP digging through social media looking for connections. It was a years-long Canadian government investigation examining an enormous volume of MAC’s own records. And one of the issues investigators examined was MAC’s relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood.
A subsequent study by George Washington University’s Program on Extremism analyzed the CRA records released through MAC’s litigation. Researchers Lorenzo Vidino and Sergio Altuna reported that investigators examined whether MAC was advancing an “unstated non-charitable collateral purpose”—advancing the Muslim Brotherhood as an organization.
According to the researchers, the CRA examined evidence involving MAC leaders and the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, Canadian organizations supporting the Egyptian Brotherhood, and apparent membership transfers between MAC and Brotherhood organizations overseas.
The evidence also included MAC leaders allegedly holding senior positions connected to Egypt’s Freedom and Justice Party and the government of former Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, a Muslim Brotherhood leader.
Investigators examined MAC facilities allegedly being made available for Brotherhood-aligned activities and what the CRA viewed as members of Brotherhood organizations overseas being able to transfer their membership to MAC after moving to Canada.
The CRA itself questioned how an organization presenting itself as entirely Canadian could transfer memberships to and from foreign organizations.
MAC disputed the significance of that evidence, but disputing evidence is not the same as discrediting it. Additionally, another research group reached similar conclusions as ISGAP.
In 2025, George Washington University’s Program on Extremism published The Muslim Brotherhood in the West? Evidence from a Canadian Tax Authority Investigation, based on records released through MAC’s own litigation.
Researchers described MAC as a Muslim Brotherhood “legacy group” and wrote that MAC had acknowledged being founded by individuals linked to the Brotherhood and being inspired by the movement’s ideology.
The researchers highlighted what they described as communications and coordination between Brotherhood figures overseas and counterparts in Canada, along with apparent organizational membership transfers across borders.
That evidence predates ISGAP's new report.
MAC is correct that the CRA audit was eventually completed and that the agency backed away from its preliminary recommendation to revoke MAC’s charitable status. But MAC's response attempts to turn that into something much broader.
A regulator changing preliminary findings after receiving additional submissions is not the same thing as a court finding the underlying evidence false. No court made that finding.
The changing CRA record was part of the reason the Court of Appeal upheld dismissal of MAC’s challenge: MAC went to court before the administrative process had produced a final factual record.
So MAC can accurately say that preliminary Brotherhood questions did not become part of the CRA’s final conclusion.
What it cannot accurately say is that a court “discredited” the underlying evidence.
MAC also declares that it is a “solely independent Canadian organization.” But that's an answer to a different question. Being legally independent and Canadian does not determine whether an organization has historical, ideological, personnel or organizational relationships with a transnational movement. That was precisely what CRA investigators were examining.
According to GWU’s analysis of government records, investigators scrutinized connections involving MAC leaders, organizations supportive of the Egyptian Brotherhood, MAC facilities and apparent membership transfers involving Brotherhood organizations outside Canada.
MAC’s representative demanded that its response appear alongside references to the organization so readers could receive what he called a “fair and balanced perspective.”
MAC may want to dismiss the evidence as “Islamophobia.” But it cannot rewrite the record. The Brotherhood-related evidence wasn't invented by ISGAP, and no court declared it false. Much of it came from the Canadian government's own years-long investigation, and MAC's attempts to challenge that investigation in court failed.
Twice.
