The nation's largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization is urging Tennessee Republican leaders to repudiate what they consider a racist Facebook post by a GOP state lawmaker.
Republican Rep. Sheila Butt's Facebook post said, "It is time for a Council on Christian Relations and an NAAWP in this Country."
She was commenting on an open letter from the Council on American-Islamic Relations urging potential Republican presidential candidates to reject Islamophobia and reach out to American Muslim voters.
CAIR says the reference to "NAAWP" is an apparently racist twist to the name of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, or NAACP.
Butt told The Associated Press on Wednesday that "NAAWP" stands for the "National Association of Advancement for Western Peoples," and said her post has been misinterpreted.
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