Donald TrumpDonald TrumpGiuliani casts blame on Gingrich for talk of Trump “intervention” Vulnerable GOP rep promises to “stand up” to a President Trump Top aide: Trump’s “sentiments” are with Khans MORE’s recent attacks on the Muslim parents of a fallen soldier have hurt him with military families, veterans and some survivors say.
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“While our party has bestowed upon him the nomination, it is not accompanied by unfettered license to defame those who are the best among us”, he added.
Trump’s criticism hits especially hard with Gold Star families – the name given to those who have lost loved ones to combat – said Ami Neiberger-Miller, whose younger brother Christopher was killed in the Iraq War and would have turned 31 on Wednesday. “In an ideal world we would have a candidate who would appropriately recognize his comments and apologize for them, but that’s not the situation right now”. He and first lady Michelle Obama spoke at last week’s Democratic convention in Philadelphia. But like McCain, none revoked his support of the GOP nominee in the White House campaign.
Several Republicans have disavowed Trump’s criticism of Khizr and Ghazala Khan and the Republican nominee’s calls to temporarily ban Muslims from coming to the U.S. The Khans’ point is that Trump doesn’t understand sacrifice or the Constitution when he viciously attacks people of the Muslim faith. He has stunned rivals with his ability to survive self-created controversies during the GOP primaries but faces a broader set of voters in the general election.
Embracing religion along with the military is in keeping with the overall strategy of the Democrats in the post-convention period, which is to outflank the Trump campaign on the right and seek to win sections of the Republican Party either to support Clinton openly or at least to distance themselves from Trump.
“I can not emphasise enough how deeply I disagree with Mr Trump’s statement”, McCain said in a lengthy and scathing statement. Missouri Senator Roy Blunt said the Khans “deserve to be heard and respected”.
“I think Mr. Trump has clearly had the calculation here that he is fighting back”, Clovis told MSNBC.
Few high-profile Republicans have backed Trump in his battle with the Khans. “I found them very disturbing”, said Neiberger-Miller.
In spite of those storms, Trump remains in a close race for the White House with Clinton. But even by the somewhat elastic new standards you and he have embraced, his attack on Khizr and Ghazala Khan represents a breathtaking new low.
The mogul’s sustained hostility toward the couple – alarming in part because criticism of Gold Star families has traditionally been off-limits in American political discourse – incensed Senator John McCain, a former prisoner of war once mocked by Trump for being captured in Vietnam.
“You have sacrificed nothing and no one”, he continued, then asked Trump if he had ever read the Constitution. Not the Khan speech.
In an interview with ABC’s This Week, Trump suggested Khan may have not been allowed to speak.
Trump has been engaged in an emotionally charged feud with Khizr and Ghazala Khan, whose son, Capt. Humayun Khan, was killed in Iraq by a suicide bomber on June 8, 2004. “Every day, whenever I pray, I have to pray for him, and I cry”, she wrote. That’s another reason I wanted to get involved.
The Trump campaign did not respond to requests for comment, and Wasinger refused to comment when contacted by telephone.
The appeal did not generate any help for Trump. In addition to Senate Majority Leader McConnell, House Speaker Paul Ryan issued a statement supporting the family.
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Although it’s well established that Donald Trump is pretty much willing to criticise everyone and everything – the New York Times have counted 250 people and institutions that Trump has insulted on Twitter – it seems like dismissing the Khan family has particularly outraged the American media.
