Ron Paul is criticizing President Obama on national security — for the killing of one of al Qaeda’s top figures, Anwar al-Awlaki, which was reportedly conducted jointly by American and Yemeni officials.
“Al-Awlaki was born here, he’s an American citizen, he was never tried or charged for any crimes,” Paul said today after a speech in Manchester, New Hampshire, CNN reports. “To start assassinating American citizens without charges – we should think very seriously about this.”
Paul also said: “If the American people accept this blindly and casually, that we now have an accepted practice of the President assassinating people who he thinks are bad guys, I think it’s sad.”
Paul cited the example of the late Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, as an example of how the United States should deal with terror suspects. McVeigh was arrested shortly after the 1995 bombing, was tried and convicted in 1997, and was executed in 2001.
