Donald Trump acknowledged Monday during a raucous rally in South Carolina that his call for barring all Muslim foreigners from entering the United States is “probably not politically correct.”
But he had three words for his critics: “I don’t care.”
Trump expanded on his policy proposal announced earlier in the day calling for “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until we can figure out what the hell is going on” — causing his crowd of supporters to erupt in applause.
“We have to do it,” Trump said, before citing statistics online poll of Muslims commissioned by the controversial Center for Security Policy, a group that has been accused of peddling conspiracy theories about what it calls the “Global Jihad Movement.”
That poll claimed that a quarter of Muslims living in the United States believe jihadist violence against Americans is justified.
But Trump explained Monday on Fox News that his proposal would not apply to Muslim Americans and Muslims already living legally in the United States.
“It does not apply to people living in the country, except we have to be vigilant,” Trump said on Fox News moments before he took the stage in South Carolina.
Trump introduced the proposal to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. to supporters here by remarking on the San Bernardino terror attack last week that killed 14 people.
And he warned supporters that without his controversial proposals — which in addition to banning Muslim immigrants includes surveilling and potentially shutting down mosques — the U.S. could face another deadly attack on the scale of 9/11.
“We’re gonna have to figure it out, we can’t live like this. It’s going to get worse and worse, we’re going to have more World Trade Centers. It’s going to get worse and worse, folks. We can be politically correct and we can be stupid but it’s going to be worse and worse,” Trump added.
Trump’s proposal was met here with applause and whoops from the crowd.
Some supporters chanted “send ’em home” as Trump spoke of Muslims in the U.S., but one protester’s voice broke through the cheers.
“This is racist bulls–t,” he chanted.
