The mass shooting in Orlando over the weekend has driven Donald Trump to double down on his proposal to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. Hearing this in the wake of such a huge tragedy, President Obama stepped in to slam the presumptive Republican nominee, saying that this is “not the America we want.” The president argues that Trump’s anti-Muslim rhetoric simply validates ISIS’s claims that the West hates Muslims, adding fuel to the fire and perhaps making Muslim Americans more vulnerable to radicalization.
Trump has since responded to Obama’s comments, telling the Associated Press that he “continues to prioritize our enemy over our allies.” However, if Trump thinks that his proposed ban on foreign Muslims would prioritize our allies, maybe he should listen to what they’ve said about it in the past. After he first introduced his proposal last year, the Huffington Post reported that he was flooded with criticism from U.S. allies.
A spokesperson for British Prime Minister David Cameron called Trump’s comments “divisive, unhelpful, and quite simply wrong.” London Mayor Boris Johnson asserted that he’s “out of his mind” and “he’s betraying a quite stupefying ignorance that makes him, frankly, unfit to hold the office of president of the United States.”
Canadian Foreign Minister Stephane Dion said, “It’s something that we cannot accept in Canada.” Vice President of Republicans Overseas and Israeli representative Marc Zell responded by saying, “He is a demagogue. And we as Jews, and also as Israelis, know what a demagogue is, historically.”
One foreign politician did show support for Trump’s proposed Muslim ban—Dutch far-right leader Geert Wilders. The Guardian reports that Wilders is currently on trial for “allegedly inciting hatred against the Dutch Moroccan minority,” and not for the first time either.
Donald Trump’s campaign could not immediately be reached for comment.
