Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ripped the anti-Muslim rhetoric that has emerged in the GOP primary calling it “shameful,” “offensive” and “dangerous” at Monday’s CNN Democratic town hall.
“One of the most distressing aspects of this campaign has been the language of Republican candidates, particularly their frontrunner that insults, demeans denigrates different people,” she said, referring to Donald Trump, who has called for ban on Muslim immigration. “He has cast a wide net. He started with Mexicans, he’s currently on Muslims. But I found it particularly harmful the way that he has talked about Muslims — American Muslims and Muslims around the world.”
Clinton was asked by a Muslim woman who had served in the military how she would make sure America was a safe place for the woman to raise her family.
“It’s not only shameful and contrary to our values to say that people of a certain religion should never come to this country or to claim that there are no real people of the Muslim faith who share our values and to have the kind of dismissive and insulting approach,” Clinton said, “It’s not only shameful and offensive, which it is, I think it’s dangerous.”
She said she has met with Muslim parents who say their children do not feel safe going to school. Clinton also argued the rhetoric made it harder to counter terror threats by straining the U.S.’s relationship with the Muslim community both here and abroad.
“It’s pretty hard to figure out how you are going to make coalition with the very nations you need if you spend your time insulting their religion,” she said.
