GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump warned at a forum Thursday in Iowa that hundreds of thousands of refugees from Syria will flow into the country if President Obama and Democrats get their way.
Under fire for refusing to rule out a national database for American Muslims following last week’s Paris terrorist attacks, Mr. Trump said he has sympathy for refugees that want to escape to the United States from war-torn Syria, but said the nation’s security is a higher priority at the moment.
“I feel totally bad for them, but, you know, at the same time we don’t know who they are, we don’t know where they come from, and I also feel bad for the people in this country,” said in the WHO-TV forum, sparking applause from the crowd. “You’re going to have hundreds of thousands of people coming in.”
“They are starting, they said, with 10 [thousand], but in the debate, the Democratic debate, they said 65,000 people,” Mr. Trump said. “The 10 is going to end up being 200,000, 250,000 [refugees].”
Mr. Trump said he wants the United States to lead an effort to establish a “safe zone” for refugees in Syria, but said bringing them into the United States would be “suicide.”
“There are some very disruptive people out there,” he said. “Look what a few people did in Paris.”
Democrats and civil rights groups showered Mr. Trump with criticism earlier in the day for signaling an openness to creating some sort of special identification or a national database for America’s Muslims as part of a broader effort to bolster national security.
• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.
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