[Mr. Trump said that “the time is overdue” for better screening of extremists trying to enter the country, calling for “extreme vetting.” He said only those who accept a “tolerant” view of American society would be admitted to the United States.]
By Yamiche Alcindor and
Maggie Haberman
 |
|
Donald J. Trump, the
Republican presidential nominee, discussed the rise of
global terrorism and the
Islamic State and the necessity of combating it.
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
on Publish Date August 15, 2016.
Photo by Damon Winter/The
New York Times.
Watch in Times Video »
|
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio — Donald J. Trump on Monday
described the fight against global Islamic terrorism in stark terms, invoking
comparisons to the dangers of the Cold War era in calling for “extreme vetting”
of new immigrants and issuing an open call for new alliances.
“Any country which shares this view will be our
ally,” Mr. Trump said in his address in Youngstown, Ohio, a place where the
driving concern for voters is the economy more than terrorism. “We will defeat
radical Islamic terrorism.”
He accused the Democrats of creating a “vacuum
to let terrorism grow and thrive” and specifically singled out President Obama
as “an incompetent president” for his opening to Iran and for allowing chaos to
spread throughout the Mideast by supporting the ouster of Hosni Mubarak in
Egypt, leading to the rise of Islamic State and spread of Islamic terrorism.
Mr. Trump did not mention that he himself supported the overthrow of Mr. Mubarak
in an interview with Fox News in 2011.
Still, he pledged to form a new partnership
with Israel, Egypt and Jordan to try to eradicate the spread of terrorism,
including groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah. He also suggested that the U.S.
would be well served by joining forces with Russia to fight the Islamic State
group.
“We will not defeat it with closed eyes and
silenced voices,” he said of the fight against Islamic terrorism. He added, “In
the cold war we had an ideological screening test.”
He also took aim at the approaches of the past
Democratic and Republican administrations as outdated given the urgent threats
posed to America.
“If I become president, the era of nation
building will be brought to a quick and very swift end,” Mr. Trump said. He
also said that the United States will partner with any nation willing to fight
Islamic terrorism, specifically mentioning Russia, saying the United States
would conduct “joint military operations” with such countries to defeat the
Islamic State.
Stephen Miller, Mr. Trump’s policy adviser,
portrayed the terrorism address as a road map, with more detailed speeches to
follow — much as was the case with the Republican presidential nominee’s speech
last week on the economy.
The speech is also another attempt by aides to
Mr. Trump, who favors going off script over teleprompter addresses at his
rallies, to redirect his approach to become a more on-message general election
candidate.
The speech reflects an effort by the Trump
campaign to move past the candidate’s broad call to bar Muslim immigrants from
entering the United States, issued late last year after the terrorist attacks
in San Bernardino, Calif., and in Paris. He has been heavily criticized for
suggesting a religious test for entry into the country, and his aides have
sought to change the language to reflect the targeting of regions instead,
without being specific. But instead of backing away from the words “Muslim ban”
when questioned recently, Mr. Trump described the newer version of his proposal
as an “expansion.”
Mr. Trump said that “the time is overdue” for
better screening of extremists trying to enter the country, calling for
“extreme vetting.” He said only those who accept a “tolerant” view of American
society would be admitted to the United States.
While Mr. Miller said that under a President
Trump, the United States would continue to spread a message of promoting a
“better way of life” in countries with oppressive governments that foster the
Islamic State, he argued there was a distinction between that and “nation
building,” which he associated with Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton.
Yet it was President George W. Bush, who
opposed such nation building in his 2000 presidential campaign, who became most
identified with it in Afghanistan and Iraq. Mr. Obama, preparing for his
re-election effort in June 2011, announced the withdrawal of troops in
Afghanistan in a speech in which he said, “America, it is time to focus on
nation building here at home.”
Yamiche Alcindor reported from Youngstown
and Maggie Haberman from New York.
