{"id":114919,"date":"2025-05-19T17:46:09","date_gmt":"2025-05-19T17:46:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/114919\/"},"modified":"2025-05-19T17:46:09","modified_gmt":"2025-05-19T17:46:09","slug":"measure-targeting-pro-palestine-ngos-disappears-from-us-tax-bill-politics-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/114919\/","title":{"rendered":"Measure targeting pro-Palestine NGOs disappears from US tax bill | Politics News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Washington, DC \u2013<\/strong> A measure known as the \u201cnonprofit killer\u201d has been removed from an enormous tax bill being advanced in the United States Congress, according to the bill posted online by the House of Representatives.<\/p>\n

The provision, which no longer appeared on the President Donald Trump-backed<\/a> \u201cOne Big, Beautiful Bill\u201d on Monday, would have given the executive branch the authority to strip the tax-exempt status of nonprofits that it deems supportive of \u201cterrorism\u201d.<\/p>\n

Advocates have warned that the legislative effort \u2013 which failed to pass<\/a> as a stand-alone bill last year \u2013 could be abused to crack down on groups that the administration does not agree with, particularly nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) that support Palestinian rights.<\/p>\n

The reason for the disappearance of the provision remains unclear, and experts warned it may yet reappear in the bill before the final vote in the House of Representatives, expected later in the week.<\/p>\n

The office of Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson did not immediately respond to Al Jazeera\u2019s request for comment.<\/p>\n

But with a razor-thin majority in the House, Republicans need every vote to pass the tax bill, which Trump has put at the top of his agenda in Congress.<\/p>\n

Kia Hamadanchy, senior policy counsel with the American Civil Liberties Union, said the section may have been removed to avoid putting the must-pass bill at risk, especially because the House parliamentarian, a nonpartisan office that oversees procedures, may have rejected it for violating the rules.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s possible that this is a hiccup that they didn\u2019t want, given that it wasn\u2019t even likely to go through,\u201d Hamadanchy told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t tell you that is the reason for sure. What I can tell you is that we continue to be very vigilant in case it comes back, either later this week or in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

For weeks, Trump has been calling on Congress to pass the bill, which extends his 2017 tax cuts, a key component of his economic plans<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But the proposal has faced some opposition from conservative budget hawks, who have argued that it does not cut spending enough and would add to the nation\u2019s $36.2 trillion debt. So Republicans can ill-afford unnecessary issues that could derail the passage of the legislation<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2018Chill free speech\u2019<\/p>\n

Rights groups have been rallying against the \u201cNonprofit Killer\u201d, saying it violates free speech and the right to due process.<\/p>\n

The proposal would have granted the secretary of state power to unilaterally declare an NGO \u201cterrorist supporting\u201d and make it ineligible for tax exemptions.<\/p>\n

It also said the government would not have to reveal the reason behind the designation if \u201cdisclosure of such description would be inconsistent with national security or law enforcement interests\u201d.<\/p>\n

Under the current rules, organisations certified to be nonprofits by the government get breaks on their federal income taxes. The status also makes donations to such groups tax deductible for donors.<\/p>\n

While the withdrawn measure would have allowed a targeted NGO to challenge the secretary of state\u2019s decision in court, losing the tax exempt status, even if temporarily, could have proven costly for nonprofits, especially smaller organisations.<\/p>\n

Hamadanchy said being accused of supporting terrorism could also prompt banks to close down the accounts of the groups.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then you have legal costs fighting off the designation because even if you might win in court, it\u2019s going to take time to get there, and it\u2019s going to cause a lot of damage to your organisation through that process,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd that\u2019s sort of the point because they want to chill speech.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hamadanchy noted that existing laws already make material support for a designated \u201cterrorist\u201d group a criminal offence with severe penalties.<\/p>\n

The legislative push coincided with the Trump administration\u2019s crackdown on Palestinian rights supporters, especially on college campuses.<\/p>\n

Secretary of State Marco Rubio has revoked the student visas of several Palestine advocates \u2013 who have not been charged with a criminal offence \u2013 over allegations<\/a> of \u201csupport for terrorism\u201d.<\/p>\n

Some advocacy groups have portrayed the \u201cNonprofit Killer\u201d as part of a broader push to muzzle voices critical of Israel.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis bill is designed to silence dissent, especially from Muslim, Palestinian and civil rights organizations that speak out against injustice and genocide,\u201d the Council on American Islamic Relations<\/a>\u00a0said in a statement last week.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt threatens every nonprofit that engages in advocacy, educates the public, or challenges government policy.\u201d<\/p>\n

The apparent setback for the nonprofit provision came nearly two weeks after House leaders cancelled a vote on a bill to restrict boycotts of Israel after a backlash<\/a> from right-wing legislators who voiced opposition to the measure on free speech grounds.<\/p>\n

Lara Friedman, president of the Foundation for Middle East Peace, said it would be \u201cinteresting\u201d to see how Republican leaders would deal with staunchly pro-Israel measures like the \u201cNonprofit Killer\u201d going forward.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey on the one hand likely see this as a fun opportunity to embarrass Democrats \u2013 whose opposition will be framed as anti-Israel or enabling terror and antisemitism \u2013 and on the other hand they have to worry about principled opposition from within their own ranks,\u201d Friedman told Al Jazeera in a statement.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Washington, DC \u2013 A measure known as the \u201cnonprofit killer\u201d has been removed from an enormous tax bill…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":114920,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5311],"tags":[32,7424,12,285,49,978,286,659],"class_list":{"0":"post-114919","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-donald-trump","9":"tag-israel-palestine-conflict","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-politics","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-us","14":"tag-us-canada","15":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114535752690303611","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114919","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114919"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114919\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114920"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114919"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114919"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114919"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}