Newt Gingrich offered several stunning proposals in response to Thursday’s mass terrorist attack in Nice, France during an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity.
“Let me be as blunt and direct as I can be,” the former House speaker said. “Western civilization is in a war. We should frankly test every person here who is of a Muslim background, and if they believe in Sharia, they should be deported. Sharia is incompatible with western civilization.”
Gingrich did not expand on what this test would involve, how it would be applied to the 3.3 million Muslims living in the United States or where the U.S. could deport American Muslims who are citizens. The proposal would likely violate Constitutional protections of the free exercise of religion and of due process.
Hannity asked how the U.S. government could ascertain whether an individual Muslim “really wants assimilation.”
“The first step is you have to ask them the questions,” Gingrich replied. “The second step is you have to monitor what they’re doing on the Internet. The third step is, let me be very clear, you have to monitor the mosques.”
Gingrich also called for “anybody who goes on a website favoring ISIS or Al Qaeda or any other terrorist groups” to be jailed on felony charges. Any organization that hosted such a website would also be subject to such charges, he said.
If the U.S. intelligence community is unable to diminish ISIS’ power by taking out the websites the group uses to spread its propaganda, Gingrich proposed using aggressive force.
“We should destroy them with kinetic power, using various weapons starting with predators and frankly just killing them,” he said.
Gingrich framed these radical proposals to single out Muslim Americans and engage in unprecedented levels of surveillance against U.S. citizens as essential to combatting the threat from the “medieval barbarians” who make up ISIS.
No group has yet claimed responsibility for Thursday’s attack on tourists watching fireworks along the French Riviera that left 84 dead.
Gingrich’s call for monitoring mosques and testing the religious beliefs of Muslims recalled proposals made by Donald Trump. Trump last year proposed banning all Muslims from entering the U.S., a ban that he he has since amended to apply only to immigrants from “terrorist nations.”
Gingrich is a close adviser to Trump and was on his shortlist of possible vice presidential picks.
"“The first step is you have to ask them the questions,” Gingrich
replied. “The second step is you have to monitor what they’re doing on
the Internet. The third step is, let me be very clear, you have to
monitor the mosques.”
Ask “THEM” questions individually ? And how long should this take and where ?
For a guy who’s long believed he was meant to save Western civilization, he’s pretty fucking clueless about what it is and what its values are. I have a counter-proposal, Professor Gingrich: I suggest we laugh off the national stage every person who’s a longstanding despicable crime-doing narcissistic clowny-ass dangerous fool. Then the grownups could get down to business and work on the real problems without having to listen to your inane babblings about what ought to be done.
Multiple choice test or an essay? Will those “others” have to show their work? Gingrich gets more and more bizarre while he sucks up to The Donald.
We should do that with every White Christian to see if they support the Bundy’s, if they believe in “Constitutional Law Enforcement” or the Sovereign Citizen Movement or any secession movements or White Supremacy.
I wonder what he’s gunning (pun intended) for now that VP is out. He doesn’t have a law degree, so Attorney General is out. Perhaps Director of Homeland Security. Heaven help us. But I don’t believe he could be confirmed for any cabinet level position.