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The Texas State Board of Education faces pressure from leftist activists and conservative lawmakers as it meets Friday to consider a push to place more positive references to Islam in the state\u2019s history curriculum.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Officials in the Lone Star State are reviewing social studies standards amid a push from Muslim advocacy groups, which claim current proposals are \u201cexclusionary and Islamophobic.\u201d At the same time, congressional Republicans are urging the board not to give Islam a more prominent role, particularly in response to lobbying from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a group that has been designated as a terrorist organization by Texas GOP Gov. Greg Abbott.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt has come to our attention that an extensive lobbying effort is underway to have the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) alter curriculum standards in a way that would diminish American and Texas history,\u201d Rep. Brandon Gill and other Texas Republicans wrote in a Friday letter<\/a> first obtained by The Daily Wire. The letter went on to describe CAIR as a \u201ctransnational criminal organization.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n CAIR has denied any connection to terrorism and has sued the state over the designation. Members of CAIR-Texas have <\/span>attended<\/span><\/a> recent board meetings to voice their opposition to how Muslims are currently represented in state curriculum.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Republicans also pushed back on claims they say are being introduced into the standards.<\/p>\n \u201cThe petitioners\u2019 efforts claim that Islam influenced our founding, culture, and way of life,\u201d the letter states. \u201cFor instance, the (board) recently responded to public testimony asserting that the Alamo is an Islamic building.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cSuch claims are intended to introduce sensationalized or false history into our curriculum, and it is not the (board\u2019s) responsibility to accommodate flagrant lies or cultivate spurious claims of their belonging.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n The fight over the standards has been raging for weeks, with local Muslim groups organizing in support of changes. In March, an Islamic center in Houston <\/span>hosted<\/span><\/a> a discussion on \u201cchallenging Islamophobia in Texas schools.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Gill said that Islam played no major role in the founding or development of Texas and warned against what he described as \u201crevisionist history.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cStudents should be taught age-appropriate facts and hard-truths, even when it is uncomfortable. Islam did not play a role in the founding or development of Texas, and to say so would be an outright lie,\u201d he wrote.<\/span><\/p>\n The other lawmakers who signed onto the letter include Reps. Chip Roy, Wesley Hunt, Michael Cloud, Nathaniel Moran, Ronny Jackson, Lance Gooden, Brian Babin, Keith Self, and Pat Fallon.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n