US President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order starting the process of designating some chapters of the Muslim Brotherhood as foreign terrorist organisations.
The White House said the order directs Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to begin the process.
"This order sets in motion a process by which certain chapters or other subdivisions of the Muslim Brotherhood shall be considered for designation as Foreign Terrorist Organisations," according to the order.
The White House singled out Brotherhood chapters in Lebanon, Egypt and Jordan, saying they "engage in or facilitate and support violence and destabilisation campaigns that harm their own regions, United States citizens, and United States interests".
The White House said Muslim Brotherhood groups in those countries supported violent attacks on Israel and provided financial support to Hamas, the Palestinian militant group in Gaza.
The White House said Mr Trump "is confronting the Muslim Brotherhood’s transnational network, which fuels terrorism and destabilisation campaigns against US interests and allies in the Middle East".
The Muslim Brotherhood is an Islamist political movement founded in the late 1920s in Egypt. It has since grown into a transnational movement with branches and affiliates across much of the Arab and Muslim world.
Several countries, including the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain and Russia, already consider the Brotherhood to be a terrorist group.
Mr Trump announced the plan on Sunday, saying that it would be done "in the strongest and most powerful terms".
Far-right leaders in Mr Trump's Republican Party have been pushing for a federal designation of the Brotherhood.
The US state of Texas last week designated the Brotherhood, and the Council on American-Islamic Relations, as foreign terrorist and transnational criminal organisations.
