WASHINGTON/SAN FRANCISCO--The Trump administration wants to revamp and rename a U.S. government programme designed to counter all violent ideologies so that it focuses solely on Islamist extremism, five people briefed on the matter told Reuters.
The programme, "Countering Violent Extremism," or CVE, would be changed to "Countering Islamic Extremism" or "Countering Radical Islamic Extremism," the sources said, and would no longer target groups such as white supremacists who have also carried out bombings and shootings in the United States.
Such a change would reflect Trump's election campaign rhetoric and criticism of former President Barack Obama for being weak in the fight against Islamic State and for refusing to use the phrase "radical Islam" in describing it. Islamic State has claimed responsibility for attacks on civilians in several countries.
The CVE programme aims to deter groups or potential lone attackers through community partnerships and educational programmes or counter-messaging campaigns in cooperation with companies such as Google and Facebook.
Some proponents of the programme fear that rebranding it could make it more difficult for the government to work with Muslims already hesitant to trust the new administration, particularly after Trump issued an executive order last Friday temporarily blocking travel to the United States from seven predominantly Muslim countries. Still, the CVE programme, which focuses on U.S. residents and is separate from a military effort to fight extremism online, has been criticized even by some supporters as ineffective.
A source who has worked closely with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) on the programme said Trump transition team members first met with a CVE task force in December and floated the idea of changing the name and focus. In a meeting last Thursday attended by senior staff for DHS Secretary John Kelly, government employees were asked to defend why they chose certain community organizations as recipients of CVE programme grants, said the source, who requested anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the discussions.
Although CVE funding has been appropriated by Congress and the grant recipients were notified in the final days of the Obama administration, the money still may not go out the door, the source said, adding that Kelly is reviewing the matter. The department declined comment. The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
Some Republicans in Congress have long assailed the programme as politically correct and ineffective, asserting that singling out and using the term "radical Islam" as the trigger for many violent attacks would help focus deterrence efforts. Others counter that branding the problem as "radical Islam" would only serve to alienate more than three million Americans who practice Islam peacefully.
Many community groups, meanwhile, had already been cautious about the programme, partly over concerns that it could double as a surveillance tool for law enforcement.
