President Obama hit back at Republican presidential hopeful Sen. Ted Cruz (TX) during a news conference on Monday at the G20 summit, saying it was “shameful” to suggest a “religious test” for refugees from the Middle East.
Obama didn’t mention Cruz by name, but his remarks came after the GOPer said Muslim refugees from Syria should be barred from coming to the United States but that Christians should be admitted.
“When I hear folks say that well maybe we should just admit the Christians but not the Muslims, when I hear political leaders suggesting that there would be a religious test for which a person who is fleeing from a war-torn country is admitted, when some of those folks themselves come from families who benefited from protection when they were fleeing political persecution, that’s shameful,” Obama said. “That’s not American. That’s not who we are.”
In the wake of Friday’s terrorist attacks in Paris, the Texas senator has argued that accepting Muslim refugees threatens America’s national security.
“There is no meaningful risk of Christians committing acts of terror,” Cruz said at a South Carolina campaign event on Sunday, according to the Washington Post.
Cruz’s father, Rafael Cruz, fled the regime of US-backed Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista for Texas in 1957.
Obama said on Monday that openness toward political refugees is essential to America’s national identity.
“The values that we are defending, the values that we’re fighting against ISIL for, are precisely that we don’t discriminate against people because of their faith,” Obama told the audience at the G20 summit. “We don’t kill people because they’re different than us. That’s what separates us from them. And we don’t feed that kind of notion that somehow Christians and Muslims are at war.”
The president commended his predecessor and Cruz’s fellow Texan, George W. Bush, for defending Muslims in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.
“I had a lot of disagreements with George W. Bush on policy, but I was very proud after 9/11 when he was adamant and clear about the fact that this is not a war on Islam,” Obama said. “And the notion that some of those who have taken on leadership in his party would ignore all of that, that’s not who we are.”
"when some of those folks themselves come from families who benefited from protection when they were fleeing political persecution, that’s shameful,”
Crush.
No f*cks left to give. I love this President.
Not American, but very Texan.
At times like this, you really appreciate having an adult in the room.
Cruz is going to get particularly violent in his rhetoric on this. I saw a comment from him over the weekend, sneering at the concept of targeted bombings, basically along the lines of “they indiscriminately kill innocent civilians, so we should too!!”
All of the republican nominees are acting like the Beirut bombings didn’t even occur. And the only refugee’s worth saving are the Christian ones. Trump is now suggesting we shut down all mosques in the States.
The screeching about “radical Islam” is very quickly going to be just “Islam” by the end of the week. Which is precisely what ISIS was aiming for.
Religious test is a great idea because we know that there has never been an act of violence committed by other religions. Wait, there have been? Well, those are OK because they were in the name of the good religion.
That’s the basic thinking on display here by Cruz et al.