Donald Trump said Friday that he was being sarcastic when he made the inflammatory claim earlier this week that Obama “founded” the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
Advertisement
Donald Trump spent most of the day yesterday calling President Obama the “founder of ISIS”, in addition to naming Hillary Clinton its co-founder.
“In many respects, you know, they honour President Obama”, Trump said Wednesday during a raucous campaign rally outside Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Doesn’t she bear some responsibility if not the founder, some responsibility for the rise of ISIS?
Earlier Thursday, Trump stood firm when asked by CNBC whether it was appropriate to say a sitting USA president founded a jihadist group determined to kill Americans. “He gets the most valuable player award”.
Trump first claimed Obama was “the founder of Isis” on Wednesday night at a rally in Sunrise, Florida.
HEWITT: But he’s not sympathetic to them.
Donald Trump can’t resist an applause line, and when the crowd applauded for his repetition of the lie that Obama founded ISIS, he had to walk it back. “He was the founder”. It was also important to realize that Assad, by what he did in his country, allowed ISIS to move into what was then Iraq – al Qaeda in Iraq into Syria and get strongholds and recruit. He was killed in Iraq in 2006 after the US dropped two 500-pound bombs on him. “I do”, Trump says, using another acronym for the extremist group. “Although the Second Amendment people, maybe there is, I don’t know”, Trump said.
Clinton later hit back on Thursday on Twitter, saying it was Trump who was unfit to be president. “Again, I think Mr. Trump will answer this question better than anybody else, and I think it should be left for him to answer”.
When a CNBC host suggested that such rhetoric might not play well in battleground states, Trump insisted that his commitment to the truth took precedence over politicalexpediency.
Trump’s remarks followed a troubled week for the Republican candidate in which he drew strong criticism for a persistent confrontation with the family of a Muslim American soldier who was killed in Iraq and for his initial refusal to support prominent Republican congressional candidates in their primary races. “He’s the founder. He founded ISIS”.
Trump followed up with subsequent tweets this morning, stating: “ISIS gained tremendous strength during Hillary Clinton’s term as Secretary of State”.
Advertisement
CNN wasn’t the only news organization that covered the comments seriously, but Trump’s latest tweet will probably dominate another news cycle.
