Shaykh Uthman ibn Farooq laid out a vision for an Islamic America during a livestreamed event at the Sufaraa Center in McKinney, Texas, last week. Authentic Ilm Mission, which hosted the event, has plans for a 40,000-square-foot facility near Plano, Texas, and used the livestream featuring Farooq to fundraise for the multipurpose school and Islamic community center.
“We love this country,” Farooq said. “We want good for this country. And that’s why we want Islam for this country, ’cause we think that’s the best thing. And we’re not going to be ashamed of that.”
He went on to argue that Muslims are fully within their constitutional rights to adhere to Sharia law. “We’re Muslims. That’s our identity, and there’s nothing wrong with that. The Constitution of this country protects that. That’s our right to believe in the Sharia. Yes, I said it. That’s our right.”
“There’s communists that believe in communism and live in America,” Farooq continued. “The current mayor of New York is a socialist. Bernie Sanders is open socialist. … Our president — I don’t know what the, what he is actually. I don’t think he knows what he is. … But he has that right according to the Constitution. … There are Satanists. There’s a church of Satan. I’ve debated them.”
Farooq works with the One Message Foundation and is a viral social media influencer. His Instagram and YouTube pages boast 430,000 and 1.4 million followers, respectively. The One Message Foundation’s homepage says it, together with other groups, converted nearly 1,500 individuals to Islam during the World Cup. Farooq’s social media videos feature his commentary speaking of polygamy as legitimate and speculating that President Donald Trump may be an evil spirit.
The event host, Authentic Ilm Mission (AIM), which is led by Dr. Karim AbuZaid and Farooq, is fundraising for an expansive Islamic facility “in one of the most densely Muslim-populated areas between Richardson and Plano,” according to the group’s website. On the former site of a Christian church, the four-acre campus and its facilities — 40,000 square feet in total — will be used to host “Islamic K-12 education,” a seminary, and training in Da’wah, that is, Islamic proselytization.
The AIM website describes the project as having raised $300,000 of the $800,000 needed, with donations reportedly coming from 1,500 individuals in 50 countries. The site features a video of a mosque displacing a beautiful church building with a steeple and classical brick architecture. A different graphic on the website allows users to swipe across the screen to replace an image of the church building at the address listed with an image of the new mosque. The number of mosques in America has surpassed 3,000 in recent years.
During the livestreamed event, Farooq said that the classes offered at the “Da’wah center” would help “educate our youth to have that knowledge … [and] refute Christian apologists and Islamophobes and hadith-rejectors and anybody else that’s trying to deviate Islam.”
He also warned against compromising Islamic principles, framing the warning in terms of Muslims’ military conquests in Europe. Muslims being driven out of parts of Europe in and around the 1500s demonstrate the consequences of compromise, Farooq said: “Portugal and Spain, Sicily — these areas were under Muslim rule for around 700 years. … When the Muslims went there, one of the leaders of the Muslims … went with sword in hand, iman in heart … The Quran was on their tongues. It was in their hearts. It was in their actions. And Allah made them victorious. Victory after victory until, to the middle of Europe, they were victorious. Seven hundred years of compromise, of trying to accommodate ended with what? the Muslims losing.”
Farooq is no stranger to controversy. Yvette Cooper, who was serving as home secretary at the time, barred Farooq from visiting the United Kingdom due to comments justifying Muslims having sex with female captives, a position endorsed by Muhammad in the Quran. Farooq visited Europe in April 2025. When speaking at a Birmingham mosque, he said, “The future is ours. Every ideal nightmare of a Muslim Europe will come true.”
Texas has one of the highest Muslim populations in the United States at more than 300,000, and a significant portion resides in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. The intended site for the Authentic Ilm Mission facility is situated about 20 minutes southwest of the East Plano Islamic Center (EPIC) mosque, which boasts 10,000 members and is embroiled in controversy that garnered nationwide attention with its efforts to establish a Muslim city. The legal battle over EPIC’s planned complex of more than 450 housing plots is ongoing.
