Donald Trump’s Muslim ban proposal throws Republican Party into chaos

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Donald Trump’s Muslim ban proposal throws Republican Party into chaos

2:08 CAT | 09 Dec 2015

The Guardian

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump was disowned by his own party’s top leadership on Tuesday and faced calls to drop his White House bid as the world reacted with outrage to his plan for a ban on Muslims entering the United States.

The billionaire frontrunner’s plan tipped the Republican presidential race into chaos, with party leaders from the chairman of the Republican National Committee to former US vice-president Dick Cheney condemning the idea as “un-American”. Trump toured the US television studios in unrepentant form, unmoved by the gale of criticism that followed his speech aboard an aircraft carrier on Monday evening. Speaking aboard the USS Yorktown, he acknowledged that his proposal was “probably not politically correct”, before whipping up a cheering crowd and adding: “But I Don’t Care”. “We need a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States while we figure out what the hell is going on,” Trump said. “We are out of control.”

But for perhaps the first time of the election cycle, Trump seemed at risk of being drowned out by voices raised on all sides in protest against him. Horrified Muslims in the United States heard in Trump’s rhetoric an echo of Nazism, and they joined the Republican condemnation of Trump as un-American. “He’s trampling on our constitution and packaging it as a snake oil cure for our security concerns,” said Kassem Allie, executive administrator of the Islamic Center of America in Dearborn, Michigan, one of the largest mosques in the US. “He’s using fear-mongering reminiscent of Nazi Germany and Stalin.”

A significant silence that had followed past outrageous statements by Trump – in which Republican elders have declined direct confrontation, and the targets of his remarks have seemed humiliated or intimidated – seemed finally shattered at the billionaire’s latest offense.

Republican establishment figures from Cheney to rivals like Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio and RNC chairman Reince Priebus ramped up their condemnations. “Well, I think this whole notion that somehow we need to say no more Muslims and just ban a whole religion goes against everything we stand for and believe in,” Cheney told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt. “I mean, religious freedom’s been a very important part of our, our history.”

House speaker Paul Ryan said Trump’s remarks violated the constitution and were “not who we are as a party”. “This is not conservatism,” the Wisconsin representative said, adding: “Some of our best and biggest allies in this struggle and fight against radical Islam terror are Muslims.”

There were signs that Trump was not deaf to the Republican insurrection. He appeared to make a veiled threat on Twitter on Tuesday to run as an independent. “A new poll indicates that 68% of my supporters would vote for me if I departed the GOP & ran as an independent,” he wrote. While such a bid would face logistical barriers that differ from state to state, experts have said an independent run would be possible for a candidate with money to spend on lawyers and signature-collection campaigns. Such a move would have a potentially disastrous effect on Republican hopes of winning back the White House.

Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton seized the moment with an 850-word statement on her website calling Trump’s idea “shameful” and “dangerous” and little more than the logical conclusion of other Republican candidates’ calls for religious tests for Syrian refugees. She also sent a message of support to American Muslims, telling them: “This is your country, too. I’m proud to be your fellow American. And many, many other Americans feel the same way.”

White House press secretary Josh Earnest called Trump’s remarks “incendiary” and “morally reprehensible”, adding: “What Donald Trump said yesterday disqualifies him from serving as president.”

Source: The Guardian