Trump: Liberals let this ‘animal’ into US
DoNALD Trump branded the New York terror suspect an ‘animal’ yesterday as he blamed liberal immigration policies for allowing him into the US.
He said the Uzbek suspect entered the US under a controversial ‘diversity’ visa scheme and called for America to ‘step up’ its ‘extreme vetting programme’ designed to weed out potential terrorists among aspiring immigrants.
The President called for the ISIS supporter to be ‘sent to Gitmo’ – the Guantanamo Bay detention centre which treats inmates as enemy combatants.
Mr Trump said the US, and other countries ‘with similar problems’, needed to get ‘much tougher, much smarter and much less politically-correct’ with Islamic terrorists. ‘We need quick justice and strong justice for these animals.
‘What we have right now is a joke and a laughing stock,’ he said, making clear that the same was happening in Europe. Mr Trump repeatedly called Sayfullo Saipov an ‘animal’ and said he had started the process to end the Diversity Visa Lottery, a controversial programme that annually distributes around 50,000 visas to countries where there is a low rate of immigration to the US.
Mr Trump, who said he had been told Saipov got into the US in 2010 on the diversity programme, also vowed to end ‘chain migration’ and admit immigrants purely based on their individual merit.
He said that, based on preliminary information, the attacker ‘was the primary point of contact for 23 people, that came in or potentially came in with him and that is not acceptable’. He said the 23 were family members who could also ‘represent a threat’ to the US. As Democrats condemned him for politicising the tragedy, Mr Trump started the day with a series of provocative tweets. He retweeted a conservative commentator who blamed Democrats for ‘helping to import Europe’s problems’.
Vowing to ‘stop this craziness’, Mr Trump said: ‘The terrorist came into our country through what is called the “Diversity Lottery Visa Programme”. I want merit.’
The President singled out for blame New York Democrat senator Chuck Schumer who has supported the lottery programme – which favours applicants from smaller countries to ensure immigrants don’t only come from developed countries but also from poorer ones. The diversity visa has long been a point of contention. The visas offer immigrants green cards, permanent legal residence and a path to citizenship.
Mr Schumer, the top Senate Democrat, said the President ‘should stop tweeting and start leading’, adding: ‘Immigration is good for America.
‘President Trump, instead of politicising and dividing America, which he always seems to do at times of national tragedy, should be focusing on the real solution – anti-terrorism funding – which he proposed cutting in his most recent budget.’
New York state governor Andrew Cuomo said Mr Trump’s tweets ‘tended to point fingers’. He argued that politicising the attack would ‘play into the hands of the terrorists’ who sought to ‘disrupt and divide’.
And New York’s mayor Bill de Blasio said the city supported ‘very thorough vetting’ of immigrants on an individual basis and ‘not because of their religion or their country of origin’.