Washington:Republican candidate Donald Trump roiled the United States presidential campaign once again, with the jaw-dropping assertion Wednesday that Hillary Clinton and President Barack Obama “founded” the IS group.
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The billionaire businessman specifically took aim at CNN for reporting “so seriously” that he would call Obama and Clinton the founder and “MVP” of ISIS.
Trump has long blamed Obama and his former secretary of state – Clinton – for pursuing Mideast policies that created a power vacuum in Iraq that was exploited by IS, another acronym for the group.
Following the suggestion on Wednesday evening, Trump went back on his words on Friday, insisting he had not meant to say President Obama and Democratic candidate Clinton founded ISIS. He repeated it in an interview on Thursday morning with CNBC.
In an interview with radio personality Hugh Hewitt, Trump said his decision to use the term “founder” was “no mistake”.
Some people rushed to Trump’s defense, pointing out that he might have meant that Obama is responsible for the rise of ISIS, rather than literally founding the group.
Trump raised eyebrows when he made that claim and gave many details of what he said he saw in the film. “I give her too, by the way”, he added, referring to his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton.
Looking at recent opinion polls, Trump is losing ground to Clinton in the presidential race – she has an average lead of 7.7 percentage points.
Dozens of Democrats and critics in the media immediately claimed that Trump was calling for people to assassinate Clinton.
This political shitshow began Wednesday, when Trump said at a Florida rally, “ISIS is honoring President Obama”.
Later, Trump’s spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany got schooled by CNN’s guest host John Berman – textbook style – on who exactly ISIS is and its founder.
Yet critics pointed out that his was not the first time Mr Trump had indulged in using very loaded language about the president.
On Friday, amid mounting outrage and accusations that Mr Trump was engaging in dog whistle politics, he claimed that he had simply been joking.
Recent opinion polls have shown Trump losing ground to Clinton, a former US senator and first lady, in the race for the November 8 election.
The Republican presidential nominee has endured 10 days of negative headlines after a string of controversial comments.
The Islamic State group began as Iraq’s local affiliate of al-Qaida, the group that attacked the USA on September 11, 2001.
Hillary Clinton responding on Twitter writing, “Anyone willing to sink so low, so often should never be allowed to serve as our Commander-in-Chief”. As president, Obama completed the troop drawdown in Iraq that began under President George W. Bush.
After Trump’s feud with the Khan family, Pence put out a statement clarifying the campaign’s position.
Wait, is Trump actually saying Obama founded ISIS?
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Trump is on the trail Friday in Pennsylvania – a must win state.
