He vowed to partner with any country that shares his goal of defeating the extremist group, regardless of other strategic disagreements, and named Russian Federation as a nation he would like to improve relations with.
Advertisement
“We can’t always choose our friends, but we know that we have to fight our enemies”.
“France is suffering gravely”, he added as he listed all the recent terrorist attacks in Europe and the U.S. in detail.
“Today we begin a conversation about how to make America safe again”, said the candidate as he compared the threat from radical Islamic terrorism to that of “Nazism” and communism and claimed it was a responsible for an attack outside the Middle East “war zone” every 84 hours this summer. “Yeah, I guess so”, he told the radio host when asked.
Donald Trump will outline his plan to fight ISIS in a national security speech Monday, arguing the terror group has “spread dramatically” under the watch of both President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
Trump insisted that Obama’s failure to reach an agreement with the Iraqi government to leave a residual presence of American troops in Iraq and his withdrawal timetable “surrendered our gains in that country and led directly to the rise of ISIS”. It is worth noting that Trump had implied that his comments on North Atlantic Treaty Organisation had led to the creation of that post.
Trump will also expand upon his proposed Muslim ban, saying in his speech that as president he will order a suspension of visas to countries where adequate screenings cannot be performed.
“As he laid out in his Orlando remarks, Mr Trump will describe the need to temporarily suspend visa issuances to geographic regions with a history of exporting terrorism and where adequate checks and background vetting can not occur”, Mr Miller said.
“In the Cold War, we had an ideological screening test”.
The GOP candidate will also propose a new immigration policy under which the USA would stop issuing visas in cases where adequate screenings can’t be performed.
He wagged his finger at his audience in the former steel town of Youngstown, Ohio, and repeated the phrase “extreme vetting” to convey seriousness, but he gave no details about what this might entail.
Hillary Clinton’s campaign released the following statement on Trump’s stop in Youngstown and the press conference called by the OH leaders. “And we have enough problems in our country right now”.
The latter plan has changed since he first suggested a “total and complete” ban on Muslim immigration.
And while the Republican presidential nominee argued against nation-building in a foreign policy speech Monday, he advocated for something even more grandiose: seizing Iraq’s oil wealth in the aftermath of the USA invasion in 2003 that toppled Saddam Hussein.
Trump explicitly tied immigration to the threat of terrorism in the United States, which has been one of his key themes throughout the campaign. Top Republicans have called on Trump to straighten out his flailing campaign.
The proposal was one of several Trump outlined in an OH speech laying out his vision for fighting Islamic extremism.
Trump’s expected call to work with Muslim allies comes against a backdrop of fierce criticism and condemnation of the Republican candidate from Muslims in the U.S. and overseas since December, when he proposed “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the US”.
The real-estate mogul said he would, as president, work with Middle Eastern allies, even as he has faced heated criticism for his call in December to ban Muslims from entering the United States.
Possible entrants to the US would have to answer questions about whether they believed in a “tolerant” way of life and agreed with US values about the treatment of women, the rule of law, and the primacy of the US Constitution.
Advertisement
He went a step further calling for the USA to be cautious when admitting refugees and immigrants from countries that have anti-Semitic and anti-gay views. He wants to block those who sympathize with extremist groups or don’t embrace American values. His most specific prescriptions centered on changing US immigration policy to keep potential attackers from entering the country.
