Obama’s visit to the Baltimore mosque was apparently in reaction to Trump, who has pledged to bar Muslims from entering the USA if elected president.
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For Muslim advocates, Obama’s visit was a long-awaited gesture to a community that has warned of escalating vitriol against them that has accompanied the public’s concern about the Islamic State and other extremist groups.
Obama, who is a Christian, mocked Trump at the 2011 White House Correspondent’s Dinner, saying that Trump probably thinks the US government also faked the moon landing and rattled off other conspiracy theories.
The “inexcusable” rhetoric against Muslims being employed by some politicians “has no place” in the United States, President Barack Obama said Wednesday in a speech at the Islamic Society of Baltimore.
Pushing back at critics who say he should talk about “Islamic terrorists”, he said that, “We shouldn’t play into terrorist propaganda”.
“We have to be consistent in condemning hateful rhetoric and violence against everyone, and that includes against Muslims here in the United States of America”.
“It’s just offensive to a lot of Americans who recognize that those kinds of cynical political tactics run directly contrary to the values…in this country”, said Earnest at Tuesday’s briefing. “Thank you for lifting up the lives of your neighbors and for helping keep us strong and united as one American family”.
According to the Pew Research Center, Islam is the fastest growing religion.
President Barack Obama arrived in Baltimore County on Wednesday to make his first visit to a US mosque at a time when Muslims have found themselves the target of fiery rhetoric on the campaign trail and violence in some parts of the country.
He said: “We’ve seen children bullied, we’ve seen mosques vandalised”. “I’m in good company”, he said.
As he decried Republican counter-terror plans that would single out Muslims for extra scrutiny, Obama insisted that applying religious screens would only amplify messages coming from terrorist groups. “Engagement with Muslim Americans communities must never be a cover for surveillance”, Obama said.
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“We can’t be bystanders to bigotry”, Obama said. “No, it’s true. Look it up”. “So I was not the first”, he said lightly as the audience laughed. He noted that founding father Thomas Jefferson specifically mentioned Muslims when he spoke about the American right to freedom of religion.
