White House press secretary Josh Earnest took Republicans to task Tuesday for blocking gun control measures while pushing attack “talking points” about President Barack Obama’s rhetoric on terrorism.
“Using the term ‘radical Islamic extremism’ is not a counterterrorism strategy. It is a political talking point,” Earnest said in an interview on CNN.
He also said Republicans in the Senate who have criticized Obama for not naming “radical Islam” as the enemy “have that luxury,” while the President, who’s focused on putting forward counterterrorism policy plans, does not.
In an address last week, Obama slammed GOP lawmakers’ fixation on the term as a “political distraction,” saying that “calling a threat by a different name does not make it go away.”
Presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton echoed the sentiment. She said, “it matters what we do, not what we say” and said “radical jihadism” and “radical Islamism…mean the same thing.”
