The comments were widely condemned, including by Trump’s opponent, Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
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He told CNN in March 2007 that the USA should declare victory and get out because Iraq was going to get further bogged down in civil strife. You meant that he created the vacuum, he lost the peace.
Stressing that Obama “is not the founder of ISIS”, she added that “it can be hard to muster outrage as frequently as Donald Trump should cause it, but his smear against President Obama requires it”.
“This is another example of Donald Trump trash-talking the United States”.
Just to clear things up, in case there’s still any confusion: ISIS was founded by a man named Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, not President Obama.
Trump has made similar comments in the past, calling Clinton, a former secretary of State, the “founder of ISIS” and saying “she should get an award from them” last week. In fact, in sports they have awards, he gets the most valuable player award. He was swiftly corrected from Trump, who actually thinks President Obama is “the most valuable player” for ISIS.
In an interview with conservative radio talk show host Hugh Hewitt, Trump was asked to clarify the statement.
“He doesn’t get it, or he gets it better than anybody understands”, Mr Trump said of the president.
In a follow-up tweet Friday morning that may have also been related to the recent controversy, Trump hit media personalities who were “working so hard and so seriously to try and figure me out”.
The tweet was the first move by Trump to moderate his comments, which he had repeated multiple times since he featured them in a speech Wednesday night and which came under fire from the Clinton campaign and many Democrats. He called Clinton the “founder of ISIS” earlier this month. “I give her, too, by the way, Hillary Clinton”, Trump said.
“They should call (Obama) an enabler”.
Trump’s commentary also seemed to echo an opinion expressed by a leader he says he respects, Russian President Vladimir Putin.
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Trump even acknowledged that some tried to tell him to instead say Obama was an “enabler”. “All I do is tell the truth, I’m a truth teller”, he said. I don’t know if you heard that. “I do not think it means what you think it means”.
