Washington: Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said on Wednesday he is open to the idea of closing down some mosques within the US if he is elected president, in order to fight the IS.
In an extensive telephone interview with Fox Business Network, host Stuart Varney asked Trump, Britain was considering closing some mosques in response to terror threats, if elected president, would take similar action?
“I would do that, absolutely, I think it’s great,” Trump responded. “If you go out, you go fight for ISIS, you can’t come back. Why can’t you do it? You can do it here.”
Varney asked the Republican presidential aspirant, “Can you close a mosque? I mean, we do have religious freedom.”
“Well I don’t know,” Trump said. “I mean, I haven’t heard about the closing of the mosque. It depends, if the mosque is, you know, loaded for bear, I don’t know. You’re going to have to certainly look at it,” replied the controversial business tycoon.
“But I can tell you one thing,” Trump said. “If somebody goes over and they want to fight for ISIS, they wouldn’t be coming back.”
The role of Islam in the U.S. has become a hot button issue among the Republican presidential candidates.
In September, Ben Carson, GOP presidential candidate said that Islam is antithetical to the US Constitution and no Muslim should be president of the USA.