Congressman Matt Cartwright's Statements on Gulen
and his Campaign Donors
Page created Nov 23, 2014; last updated Nov 30, 2014
Pennsylvania's 17th Congressional District is currently represented by Congressman Matt Cartwright. His district includes the small town of Saylorsburg where the Golden Generation Worship and Retreat Center is located. This is where Fethullah Gulen lives.
Generous political contributions from Gulenists
Mr. Cartwright has received generous contributions from followers of Fethullah Gulen. The following table shows contributions only from the 2014 election cycle; there may be additional ones from previous cycles (see this page). According to the opensecrets.org website, the campaign donations received by Cartwright from all sources in the 2014 cycle came to a total of $1,061,729.
Gulenist contributions therefore constituted 1.86% of Cartwright's total contributions for the 2014 election cycle.
Gulenist contributions therefore constituted 1.86% of Cartwright's total contributions for the 2014 election cycle.
Salih "Sal" Dincer was shown in a photo in a Pocono Record photo gallery published on April 16, 2010. The piece was entitled "Muslim Retreat Center in Saylorsburg," and featured a series of photographs of the Golden Generation Worship and Retreat Center, including some of Gulen's followers. Salih Dincer is shown seated at a table alongside Kemal Ozgur, Erkan Acar, and Bekir Aksoy. Erkan Acar was the author of a Marywood University propagandist thesis praising Gulen and his schools. Bekir Aksoy was Gulen's spokesman in a 60 Minutes piece entitled "U.S. Charter Schools Tied to Powerful Turkish Imam," which ran on May 13, 2012.
David Eygoren, Omer Alici, and Husemettin Erciyas have served as board members of the Lehigh Dialogue Center, a Gulenist organization. Much evidence shows clearly that the Lehigh Dialogue Center is tied to the Gulen Movement. It is a member organization of the Turkic American Alliance, the umbrella organization for the Gulen Movement in the United States. A youtube video entitled "Fethullah Gulen Ramazan Dinner by Lehigh Dialogue Center CA" was uploaded on Dec 10, 2011 to the account "FGulenEn." It is a segment of an Ebru TV broadcast (Ebru TV is also run by the Gulen Movement) showing a typical "dialog" event at the Center. (The youtube page erroneously shows the location as "California." The event clearly took place in Pennsylvania. It is unknown whether this mention of California is truly an error or merely another manifestation of the Gulen Movement's "strategic ambiguity.")
David Eygoren also shows as domain registrant for the domain dunya.tv, which is a Kurdish-language station in Turkey that is well-known to be run by the Gulen Movement. (See for example this Today's Zaman piece of March 29, 2012; or this webpage on the "Hizmet News" website where it is stated that "Also, there is a TV channel founded by those inspired by the vision of Gulen called Dunya TV.") Eygoren's name furthermore appears in the domain name registration for lehighdialogue.org, the website of the Gulenist Lehigh Dialogue Center.
Murat Guzel has served as a board member of the Gulenist organization ATCOM which is headed by Ihsan Isik, a founding board member of the now-embattled Truebright Science Academy, a Gulen charter school in Philadelphia that is facing closure. Guzel is mentioned in a Lehigh Valley Live news piece of July 28, 2012 on the Lehigh Dialogue Center. He is listed as President of Nimeks, Incorporated, a Pennsylvania corporation (link) which has Abdulkadir (a.k.a. Kadir) Veziroglu as Treasurer. Veziroglu was on the Founding Coalition of the Allentown Engineering Academy, a proposed Gulen charter school in Allentown, Pennsylvania that was rejected and failed to win an appeal to the Charter Appeal Board of the state of Pennsylvania. Veziroglu's name also appears on the domain registration of nimeks.com, the website of Nimeks, Inc. The one other corporate officer for Nimeks, Inc. currently listed on the Pennsylvania Department of State website is Erol Cebeci, who quite possibly may be the Erol Aslan Cebeci of the SETA think tank and ATCOM. SETA, which has branches in Turkey and Washington DC, was said in a 2010 Congressional Research Report by Carol Migdalovitz to be tied to the Gulen Movement. (More recent webpages (e.g. link) emerging out of the website of SETA's Turkish branch suggest that it has taken Erdogan's side in the Gulen-Erdogan split, but this does not erase SETA's past Gulenist ties.) The campaignmoney.com website shows Murat Guzel as having made a total of $57,300 in political donations in the 2014 election cycle. Guzel was a delegate at the 2012 Democratic National Convention. It is unknown whether the above-mentioned Murat Guzel has a relation to a Murat Guzel who was a board member of the Wellspring Cultural and Education Foundation, a Gulenist organization in Connecticut.
Cihan Ozturk's Linked In profile shows his location as Wind Gap, Pennsylvania, and his occupation as "teacher at Turkish Culture Center."
Congressional statement praising Fethullah Gulen on November 19, 2014
The Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 142, records that Mr. Cartwright made the following statement before Congress on November 19, 2014:
IN RECOGNITION OF FETHULLAH GULEN
HON. MATT CARTWRIGHT
of Pennsylvania
in the House of Representatives
Wednesday, November 19, 2014
Mr. CARTWRIGHT. "Mr. Speaker, today I rise to honor the exceptional work of Fethullah Gulen. Mr. Gulen has long stood as a pillar of peace and humanity and as a model for opposition in the face of rising dictatorship.
"A respected member of the Pennsylvania community, Fethullah Gulen has worn many hats throughout his life. A vocal leader of the Turkish civic movement, Mr. Gulen has been forced to live in a self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania for fear for his safety.
HON. MATT CARTWRIGHT
of Pennsylvania
in the House of Representatives
Wednesday, November 19, 2014
Mr. CARTWRIGHT. "Mr. Speaker, today I rise to honor the exceptional work of Fethullah Gulen. Mr. Gulen has long stood as a pillar of peace and humanity and as a model for opposition in the face of rising dictatorship.
"A respected member of the Pennsylvania community, Fethullah Gulen has worn many hats throughout his life. A vocal leader of the Turkish civic movement, Mr. Gulen has been forced to live in a self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania for fear for his safety.
"The
founder of the `Gulen Movement,' Fethullah Gulen has long been a voice
of reason in a world of turmoil. Widely known as a highly-respected
leader, he has encouraged Turkish citizens to vote for those who are
respectful to democracy and the rule of law, rather than one party or
another. He has consistently promoted a moderate blend of Islam in a
time of growing radicalism and is well known for his global network of
educational establishments, extending to over 140 countries. His views
promote a tolerant Islam, emphasizing hard work and education, as well
as building bridges between the Muslim and Western world and science and
religion. While the global community looks to Turkey with both growing
concern and enduring hope, it is my honor to commend Fethullah Gulen
for his tireless efforts to promote the ideals of peace, democracy, an
educated electorate, and the human rights of the Turkish people."
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Mr. Cartwright's statement is very concerning for a number of reasons:
- He refers to Mr. Gulen as a "respected member of the Pennsylvania community," completely ignoring the fact that several anti-Gulen protests took place very close to Mr. Gulen's residence.
- He asserts that Mr. Gulen is "widely known as a highly-respected leader," yet a New Yorker article of March 12, 2012 stated that "Gulen is considered one of Erdogan’s most powerful allies but is reviled and feared by much of Turkey’s population." The word "controversial" has been repeatedly used by journalists and authors in describing Gulen.
- It is well-known that Mr. Gulen and his followers were important supporters of Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan and his AKP party until the two factions became embroiled in a bitter power struggle. During this period when the Gulen Movement helped Erdogan to get elected, to stay in power, and to subdue the Turkish military, it was well-known that Erdogan's regime was corrupt and engaging in a number of undemocratic actions. Contrary to what the Gulen Movement would have us believe, Erdogan's penchant for violating the rule of law and democratic principles did not suddenly begin in December 2013 when the feud between him and Gulen flared up and came out in the open.
Mr. Gulen strongly recommended to all his followers to vote "yes" to a constitutional reform package in a referendum that took place in Turkey on Sep 12, 2010 (see Today's Zaman August 1, 2010). This package had the effect at that time of greatly increasing Erdogan's powers at the expense of the independence of Turkey's judiciary. Had Mr. Gulen been concerned with promoting the rule of law and democracy in Turkey, he would not have strongly admonished his followers to vote this way. At the time, numerous websites run by the Gulen Movement in the U.S. urged the "yes" vote as well. - Mr. Cartwright refers to Mr. Gulen as the "leader of the Turkish civic movement." Yet Mr. Gulen has long evaded any responsibility for the Gulen Movement's actions (for example, he has denied any connection to the over 140 charter schools run by the Movement) by claiming that he is not a leader and that he has nothing whatsoever to do with the Gulen Movement or its schools. Should a man be praised for something when he goes to such extreme lengths to deny his connection to it?
- Mr. Cartwright says that Mr. Gulen is "well known for his global network of educational establishments," yet completely elides that some of these educational establishments, namely charter schools in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Louisiana, have been raided by the FBI in conjunction with an ongoing federal investigation (v. Chicago Sun Times June 10, 2014 and The Advocate, Dec 12, 2013). These and other charter schools run by the Gulen Movement have also been subject to state investigations. Moreover, as documented for example by a June 6, 2011 New York Times piece and a Nov 4, 2014 article in Jacobin Magazine, these schools have become notorious for flagrantly engaging in related-party transactions that favor businesses within the Gulen network. Furthermore, the administrators of these schools have repeatedly given false information to parents, students, employees, and the public by denying that they have any connection to the Gulen Movement.
- Mr. Cartwright commends Mr. Gulen for his "tireless efforts" to promote "the human rights of the Turkish people." Ahmet Sik and Nedim Sener, two award-winning Turkish journalists who were jailed without cause for approximately a year after publishing books critical of the Gulen Movement, would likely take exception to this statement. It is well-known in Turkey that Mr. Gulen's followers infiltrated the police and the judiciary, acting in a concerted way to promote the Gulen Movement's agenda even when it conflicted with the rule of law and democratic principles. Many opponents of the Gulen Movement (or the AKP party, its strong ally at the time) were similarly jailed or tried without cause, often based on "evidence" that was patently absurd or easily falsifiable. A number of news articles from respected sources paint a disturbing picture of the Gulen Movement (see this page).
We do not doubt that Mr. Cartwright has good intentions and is well-meaning. It may be that he had not had a chance to completely review information about Mr. Gulen before making his statement. The fact that he made this statement after receiving very generous contributions from the Gulen Movement is concerning, and raises the obvious question of whether these contributions had any effect on his decision to praise Mr. Gulen without reservation. We respectfully ask Mr. Cartwright to consider either retracting his statement or issuing a clarification.