{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["http://chrissmith.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=400796", "Congressional Hearing Highlights Need to Promote Religious Freedom to Counter Extremism", "2017-12-06", "2017", "2017-12", "Republican", "House", "NJ", "Christopher Smith", "S000522", "chrissmith.house.gov", null, null, "legacy", "Promoting religious freedom must be an integral part of U.S. diplomacy to protect against the spread of religious extremism and terrorism, expert witnesses stated at a hearing on \u201cAdvancing Human Rights to Combat Extremism\u201d on Wednesday, held by Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ), Chairman of the House Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights, and International Organizations. \u00a0\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 \u201cAdvancing freedom of religion, both as an end in of itself and as means to achieve peace, stability and human flourishing, should be a core objective of U.S. foreign policy,\u201d Chairman Smith stated at the hearing.  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 \u201cReligious liberty is opposed, however, by extremists who seek to impose their vision of an ideal society upon all,\u201d Smith said. \u201cThis clash manifests itself in numerous parts of the world, in varying degrees of intensity, but is particularly acute in certain Muslim-dominated regions, where groups such as ISIS, al-Nusra, Boko Haram and al-Shabaab seek to bring all under their sway.  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 \u201cTo combat these extremists, the ideological battlefield is just as important as the territorial one.\u00a0 By emphasizing human rights principles, we counter extremist messaging, support moderate voices and promote the popular aspirations of people around the world who simply want to live in peace and freedom,\u201d Smith said.  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 The hearing highlighted strategies for advancing human rights and religious freedom in U.S. foreign policy as a means to counter violent extremism.  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 \u201cFor almost twenty years U.S. religious freedom diplomacy has been led by smart men and women, and staffed by some of the best minds in our diplomatic service. But they have been hamstrung by a lack of imagination and vision within the State Department,\u201d said Dr. Tom Farr, president of the Religious Freedom Institute and director of the Religious Freedom Research Project at Georgetown University. \u201cFortunately, that deficit has begun to diminish, in large part because of the work of the current staff and the most recent Ambassador at Large for International Religious Freedom, David Saperstein.\u201d  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 Former Kansas Governor Sam Brownback was nominated for the position of Ambassador at-Large for International Religious Freedom in July, but the Senate has yet to confirm him. This confirmation must be made immediately, Farr said.  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 \u201cPeople around the world are suffering vile religious persecution. Religion-related terror is spreading. We need Ambassador Brownback on the job,\u201d Farr said.  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 Smith\u2019s bill, The Frank R. Wolf International Religious Freedom Act, which was signed into law in December of 2016, upgraded this ambassador position within the State Department, along with providing specific tools and resources for the agency to implement religious freedom into U.S. diplomacy and all aspects of foreign policy, helping to counter violent extremism abroad. That law built upon existing law, the landmark International Religious Freedom Act of 1998.  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 The 2016 law required religious freedom training for all Foreign Service Officers; allowed the President to designate \u201cviolent non-state actors\u201d for particularly severe violations of religious freedom, and sanction individuals for those abuses; strengthened the investigations into and monitoring of religious persecution; created a \u201cDesignated Persons List\u201d for violators of religious freedom who have been sanctioned for their abuses; strengthened the Special Advisor for religious freedom position at the National Security Council; set up a comprehensive religious prisoners list of persons detained, imprisoned, tortured, and subject to forced renunciation of faith; required that the Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom report directly to the Secretary of State; elevated the position of ambassador within the department; and set up a \u201cSpecial Watch List\u201d in the existing \u201cCountries of Particular Concern\u201d list.  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 The original legislation was key to the struggle to promote religious freedom abroad, Sayyid M. Syeed, senior advisor to the Islamic Society of North America, stated to members of the subcommittee at Wednesday\u2019s hearing.  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 \u201cThis past October marked the 19th anniversary of the landmark International Religious Freedom Act of 1998, which upholds religious freedom as a core American value and a universal human right,\u201d Syeed said. \u201cThis institutional landmark Act is very important not just for us as Americans but for us as humanity. Nearly two decades after the law\u2019s passage, freedom of religion or belief is unfortunately an unrealized ideal in too many parts of the world.\u201d  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 The U.S must invest more in understanding the ideological nature of extremism, rather than only fighting it militarily, Dr. John Lenczowski, founder and President of The Institute of World Politics, stated.  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 \u201cThe United States has spent trillions of dollars mostly fighting two wars to destroy terrorism-supporting regimes, seeking out terrorists, and killing them. In doing so we have treated terrorism as principally a military and intelligence problem with little reference to what inspires it in the first place,\u201d Lenczowski said.  \r\n\r\n\u00a0 \u00a0 \u201cThis is not principally a military matter, but a problem of politics, propaganda, ideology, culture, and religious doctrines. What we are up against is a totalitarian effort to establish a temporal state (the Caliphate) by mobilizing Jihadists via an extremist interpretation of the Islamic religion,\u201d he said. \u201cTo solve this problem necessitates fighting a war of ideas. The problem is that we have virtually no ideological warriors in this war.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0 \u201cNational counterterrorism measures that are not rooted in respect for human rights risk being counterproductive,\u201d Neil Hicks, director of human rights promotion at Human Rights First, stated. \u201cWhen governments stifle peaceful dissent, muzzle the media, and prevent the legitimate activities of non-violent civil society organizations, they are not countering extremism; they are fomenting it.\u201d Click\u00a0here\u00a0for Hicks\u2019 testimony.", 1, "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z", "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["http://chrissmith.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=400796"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.9377980604767799, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}