Earlier (2017) Obama Also Put A Hold On Muslim Immigrants In 2011, And The Countries He Banned Were The Same (But He Didn’t Mean It)
The conflict in Israel has brought the Muslim issue back to American politics. Islamic terrorists striking outside of Gaza shocked the world. And the large pro-Hamas demonstrations that broke out in America and Europe illustrated the results of mass Muslim immigration. Donald Trump has highlighted the need for a renewed “Muslim Ban” and Ron DeSantis is also alluding to one, indicating Republicans are ready for this idea. America will need the GOP to stand strong against Muslim immigration with the strong possibility Islamic migrants could flood this country with progressive support. Islamic terrorism can only reach here through Open Borders. But signs are this issue could be a huge electoral winner for the GOP.
Trump spoke before a large crowd in New Hampshire and brought up the need for a new Muslim ban. He said the terror attacks in Israel made it critical for America to keep out “radical Islamic terrorists.” He didn’t call it a Muslim ban—he just said that it will be imposed on “terrorism-affected countries.” “The bloodshed and killing that we saw this week will never, ever be allowed to happen on American soil,” Trump told rallygoers. “Except for the fact that we have now allowed tens of thousands of probable terrorists into our country” [Trump Uses Support for Israel to Revive Travel Ban Talk, by Anjali Huynh, New York Times, October 9, 2023].
This isn’t the first time in this campaign that Trump has brought up the idea. It’s actually become a common feature of his rally speeches—indicating that he knows it’s playing well. He told an Iowa audience back in July that he would expand the ban if he returns to the White House:
Under the Trump administration, we imposed extreme vetting and put on a powerful travel ban to keep radical Islamic terrorists and jihadists out of our country … Well, how did that work out? We had no problem, right? They knew they couldn’t come here if they had that moniker. They couldn’t come here.
When I return to office, the travel ban is coming back even bigger than before and much stronger than before. We don’t want people blowing up our shopping centers. We don’t want people blowing up our cities and we don’t want people stealing our farms. So it’s not gonna happen.
Trump says he’d bring back ”travel ban” that’s ”even bigger than before,” by Kathryn Watson and Zac Hudak, CBS, July 7, 2023
The Muslim ban was a key to Trump’s primary victory back in 2016. After a series of deadly terror attacks in Europe and America, Trump called for a “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on.” Contrary to conventional predictions, his poll numbers shot up higher, solidifying his dominance in the race.
When Trump became president, his Muslim ban wasn’t quite a prohibition on all Muslims coming to the U.S. But it did significantly limit the number of Islamic migrants. Trump battled throughout his tenure to secure a travel ban on terrorist hotbeds. The first draft of the ban was blocked by the court, but after adding a few non-Muslim countries, the travel ban remained in place for the rest of Trump’s tenure. The countries banned included the Muslim-majority nations of Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Mali, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. The non-Muslim countries at times included North Korea, Venezuela, and South Sudan.
And the ban did have had its intended effect of reducing Muslim migration. There was an 84 percent decline in immigration from five majority-Muslim nations in the travel ban’s first two years [Muslim Travel Ban: Less Immigration And Few Waivers, by Stuart Anderson, Forbes, March 11, 2019]. Main Stream Media outlets have continued to complain about the long-term effects on Muslim migration to the U.S. years after Trump left office [‘Empty promises’: The US’s ‘Muslim ban’ still reverberates, by Jihan Abdalla, Al Jazeera, February 4, 2022]. It was one of Trump’s most successful policies, and he has every justification to bring it back.
Despite Ruling Class hysterics over the travel ban proposal, it was supported by a majority of Americans. One poll found that six in ten voters backed it. There was also evidence that even more Americans would have supported it if it hadn’t been so firmly tied to Trump [Poll: Majority of voters back Trump travel ban, by Steven Shepard, Politico, July 5, 2017]. Even with constant media propaganda telling them to welcome Syrian “migrants,” 60 percent of Americans in 2015 opposed their resettlement in the homeland [Americans Again Opposed to Taking In Refugees, by Jeffrey M. Jones, Gallup, November 23, 2015].
The current violence in the Middle East is guaranteed to increase support for such bans. Many of the potential Muslim refugees that would come to America would be Palestinian. American voters have little sympathy for them. Only nine percent of U.S. voters say they are more sympathetic to Palestinians than Israelis [Americans’ Sympathies Shift Toward Israel Following Hamas Terrorist Attack, by Cameron Easley, Morning Consult, October 12, 2023]. The idea of bringing them here with heightened fears of terrorism will lead to a similar backlash as there was to Syrian refugees years ago. The difference this time: at least part of the powerful Israel Lobby may also back restrictions on Palestinians to this country.
And Trump isn’t alone. Ron DeSantis has tied the pro-Palestine protests to mass immigration and implied we need to restrict it. He says we can’t take in Palestinians because they are “anti-Semitic” [Face The Nation—Transcript: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on ”Face the Nation,” October 15, 2023]. He has not offered a concrete travel ban like Trump, but he appears open to such an idea.
Joe Biden needs to reverse his policies on the southern border.
— Ron DeSantis (@RonDeSantis) October 11, 2023
We are vulnerable with so many military-age men coming into our country. Do you think that our enemies have not been looking at that weakness? pic.twitter.com/qZjdsxrVWo
DeSantis on pro-Hamas rallies in US cities: "We've got some serious problems. If you don't like this country, you should not be in this country. It's not just illegal immigration, it's also legal immigration." pic.twitter.com/8UM3F041PK
— TheBlaze (@theblaze) October 10, 2023
The one thing to keep in mind: many Muslims aren’t coming here the legal way. Over 70,000 illegals from “special interest” countries have been encountered at the border since Joe Biden took office. This includes thousands from such terror hotspots as Afghanistan [Thousands of ‘Special Interest Aliens’ From Middle East Countries Stopped at Southern Border Since 2021: Data, by Adam Shaw et al., Fox News, October 10, 2023]. There are also a high number of migrants on the terror watchlist being encountered at the border. By July, 160 terror watchlist suspects had been apprehended trying to get into the U.S. [Homeland Security says ‘growing’ number of people on US terror watchlist being encountered at the border, by Greg Norman, Fox News, September 15, 2023]. How many more got away?
However, most Muslims came here the legal way. Incredibly, Islamic immigration actually increased after 9/11. Even though jihadis killed thousands of Americans in the name of their religion, we let in hundreds of thousands of their coreligionists. The American Muslim population nearly doubled from 2001 to 2017. This was due entirely to immigration.
John Derbyshire wrote in 2019 that
Our Muslim population is nudging four million and growing fast. Most—around sixty percent—are immigrants, and three in ten of those immigrants arrived since 2010.
Demographic portrait of Muslim Americans, Pew Research, July 26, 2017
The students chanting terrorist slogans at American college campuses are the fruit of this change [New estimates show U.S. Muslim population continues to grow, by Besheer Mohamed, Pew, January 3, 2018].
Neoconservatives can complain all they want about the pro-Palestinian protesters, but they have to face the reality that the lax immigration policies they themselves championed brought these people here. One can only hope that this serves as a wake-up call to the likes of Ben Shapiro and others about the threat of mass immigration.
It’s important to stress the dangers of Muslim immigration. It was a critical issue to Republican voters a few years ago, but it’s diminished in salience due to the defeat of ISIS and the decrease in terrorist attacks in the U.S. More recently, Conservative Inc. outlets have been gushing over Muslim parents in burkas protesting against Woke indoctrination in their kids’ schools, and some have come to the conclusion that these are people we need as part of a conservative coalition [Muslim-Americans find common ground with conservatives over politicization of America’s schools, by Haris Alic, Fox News, October 25, 2022].
But this fails to acknowledge that nearly two-thirds of Muslims are Democrats. Eighty-six percent of Muslims voted for Biden and 94 percent believe “White Supremacy” is a big problem [Muslim Voters Voted Overwhelmingly For Biden, Support Key Democratic Priorities, Change Research, October 14, 2021]. This is not a group that will ever vote for the GOP/GAP.
The flare-up in the Middle East should disabuse everyone of this delusion. Mass Muslim immigration is a clear and present danger to the U.S. They cannot assimilate into the Historic American Nation.
It would’ve been smart of Republicans to champion a Muslim ban after 9/11. Unfortunately, they had dogmatic Immigration Enthusiast leaders at the time. Thankfully, the GOP has much better leaders now. Thus Trump and DeSantis are both talking about the threat that Muslim immigration brings to the U.S. More funding for Israel won’t stop this threat—only patriotic immigration reform will. A Muslim ban is more needed than ever. More Republicans will follow the lead set by Trump and De Santis if they hope to win in 2024.
Washington Watcher II [Email him] is an anonymous DC insider.
