(Photo by Ludovic Bertron)

The Hyatt hotel in Crystal City has agreed to host an anti-Muslim organization’s annual conference, and it’s not backing down despite pressure from advocacy groups.

ACT for America, the group in question, is classified as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Its founder, Brigitte Gabriel, is a Lebanese-born Christian who has said, among other things, that a “practicing Muslim, who believes in the teachings of the Koran, cannot be a loyal citizen of the United States” and “the portent behind the terrorist attacks is the purest form of what the Prophet Mohammed created. It’s not radical Islam. It’s what Islam is at its core.” The Atlantic has called Gabriel “America’s most prominent anti-Muslim activist.”

The Hyatt’s decision to host ACT for America’s annual conference, scheduled this year for September 4 and 5, was first reported by HuffPost. Muslim civil rights organizations have been vocal in calling on the hotel to cancel the event—the group Muslim Advocates has started a petition and a social media campaign urging Hyatt to back down.

“Hyatt is trying to turn civil rights law on its head in order to justify hosting a group dedicated to advancing bigotry. While Airbnb and other major hotel chains have declined to host events by hate group, Hyatt is making an active choice to associate with this ideology,” Scott Simpson, the public advocacy director for Muslim Advocates, said in a release.

A Hyatt spokesperson told DCist by email that it still plans to host the conference, despite any pressure they’ve received to cancel.

“We believe Hyatt hotels have a responsibility to continue providing a forum for people to respectfully and peacefully exercise their first amendment right to free speech, so long as in doing so they do not endanger any of our guests or colleagues,” the spokesperson said. “Hyatt has made the decision not to discriminate against groups who meet peacefully simply because we disagree with their messaging or because their values are different than ours.”

The non-profit organized “anti-Sharia” marches in about two dozen cities in 2017. Based in Virginia Beach, the group claims to have 750,000 members around the U.S. The SPLC says that number is likely exaggerated, but ACT for America is nonetheless the “largest anti-Muslim group in America.” The group has also bragged about ties to advisors to President Donald Trump, and Gabriel has visited the White house herself.

Derrick Morrow, Hyatt’s area vice president and general manager of the Hyatt Crystal City, implied to HuffPost that it would be illegal for the hotel to discriminate against the group by declining to hold their conference.

Robert McCaw, government affairs director for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, tells DCist that isn’t true. He points to Airbnb’s decision to boot white supremacists from their platform before “Unite the Right 2.” And last year, white supremacist Richard Spencer had so much trouble booking a hotel for his conference that he had to hold it in his office in Alexandria.

Still, it wouldn’t be the first time an area hotel has declined to cancel this particular conference. Last year, ACT for America’s annual event was held at a Marriott in Arlington. That hotel chain’s policies are unclear, though: a different Virginia Marriott declined to host the white nationalist organization American Renaissance’s annual conference in 2010.

McCaw argues that the Hyatt, and other hotels and event spaces, should treat this group the way they would any other hate group.

“I wouldn’t see the Hyatt providing rooms to the Ku Klux Klan,” McCaw says. “So why are they providing it to these guys?”