Muslims
Trump has strong and documented biases against Muslims. His senior advisor, Kellyanne Conway, ran a polling firm that took on a client who believed that Obama was a secret Muslim and that Hillary Clinton's aide Huma Abedin was a secret Muslim operative. Neither assertion is true.
During the campaign, Trump attacked a Gold Star family, the parents of a Muslim U.S. Army officer killed in Iraq, suggesting the soldier's mother had not been permitted to speak. He also did not rule out a Muslim registry, surveillance in heavily Muslim neighborhoods, and a temporary but open-ended immigration freeze on Muslim immigration.
"But what I want is a watch list. I want surveillance programs. Obviously, there are a lot of problems. … But, certainly, I would want to have a database for the refugees, for the Syrian refugees that are coming in because nobody knows where they're coming from," he said. (Source: Politifact)
This page will track statements and actions regarding Muslims made by Trump, his appointees, and his supporters.
See also Muslim Registry and Muslim Immigration Ban.
Timeline
| 2015.12.07 | Donald Trump releases a statement calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States, citing a debunked online poll from a far right think tank that claims 25% of American Muslims support terrorism against the west. donaldjtrump.com (See also 2016 Campaign) |
| 2017.01.28 | The Islamic Center of Victoria, a mosque in Texas, was set on fire just hours after Trump signed an executive order restricting immigration from Muslim-majority countries. thinkprogress.org (See also Muslim Immigration Ban, Hate Crimes) |
| 2017.02.01 | U.N. Secretary General António Guterres says Trump's Muslim immigration ban violates "our basic principles," would not reduce terrorist threats, and should be immediately lifted. nytimes.com (See also Muslim Immigration Ban, United Nations) |
| 2017.02.16 | Southern Poverty Law Center reports that the number of U.S.-based hate groups rose in 2016 for the second straight year, with the number of anti-Muslim groups nearly tripling from 34 to 101. nbcnews.com (See also Hate Crimes, Islam, Islamophobia) |
| 2017.02.19 | Trump personally invites conspiracy radio host who has claimed Obama was attempting to use Ebola to commit white genocide and who has called for 100 million Muslims to be killed to the Mar-a-Lago for a Presidents Day party. twitter.com (See also First 100 Days, Belief in Conspiracy Theories) |
| 2017.03.01 | A top White House aide is asked if Trump thinks Islam is a religion. He refused to answer. vox.com |
| 2017.03.06 | Trump's chief strategist Steve Bannon describes Islam as "a cancer" and says U.S. is fighting a "global existential war" against Islam in newly surfaced audiotapes. abcnews.go.com (See also Steve Bannon, Nationalism, Immigrants) |
| 2017.03.15 | Federal judge Derrick K. Watson issues nationwide block on Trump Administration's revised travel ban. nytimes.com (See also Muslim Immigration Ban, Immigration, Immigrants) |
| 2017.05.25 | 4th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals upholds national freeze of Trump's Muslim travel ban in a 10-3 vote. washingtonpost.com (See also Muslim Immigration Ban, Immigration, Islamophobia) |
| 2017.06.02 | The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to revive the president’s plan to temporarily ban citizens from six mostly Muslim countries. washingtonpost.com (See also Muslim Immigration Ban, Nationalism, Supreme Court) |
| 2017.06.05 | In a series of Twitter posts, Trump may have irretrievably undermined his lawyers’ efforts to persuade the Supreme Court to reinstate his executive order limiting travel from six predominantly Muslim countries. nytimes.com (See also Legal Activity, Muslim Immigration Ban) |
| 2017.06.12 | A second federal appeals court has ruled against Trump’s revised travel ban, delivering the latest in a string of defeats for the administration’s efforts to limit travel from several predominantly Muslim countries. nytimes.com (See also Muslim Immigration Ban, Legal Activity) |
| 2017.06.28 | The State Department issued new guidelines to American embassies on applying a limited travel ban against foreign visitors from six predominantly Muslim countries. nytimes.com (See also Muslim Immigration Ban) |
| 2017.06.28 | The Trump administration is expected to announce how it will implement its modified travel ban, following the Supreme Court's decision lifting a stay on the executive order imposed by two lower courts, barring travelers from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen from entering the U.S. for 90 days. npr.org (See also Muslim Immigration Ban, Foreign Policy, Iran, Syria, Legal Activity) |
| 2017.08.02 | Two close associates of Pope Francis have accused American Catholic ultraconservatives of making an alliance of “hate” with evangelical Christians to back President Trump, focusing on Steve Bannon as a “supporter of an apocalyptic geopolitics” that has stymied action against climate change and exploited fears of migrants and Muslims with calls for “walls and purifying deportations.” nytimes.com (See also Steve Bannon, Racism, Nationalism) |
| 2017.08.08 | Three days after a bomb exploded at a mosque in suburban Minneapolis, a White House official said he isn't yet convinced the attack was not a "fake hate crime." buzzfeed.com (See also Racism) Trump still hasn't said anything about the bombing, which tore through part of the mosque on Saturday while people were arriving for prayers. |
| 2017.08.15 | Weeks before a violent white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, led to three deaths and 19 injuries, the Trump administration revoked a grant to Life After Hate, a group that works to de-radicalize neo-Nazis. huffingtonpost.com (See also Racism, Department of Homeland Security, Anti-Semitism) |
| 2017.10.20 | Donald Trump has erroneously stoked racial fears by falsely linking a rise in recorded crime in England and Wales to the “spread of radical Islamic terror” in his latest outburst on Twitter. theguardian.com (See also Racism, False Statements, Assaults on Facts) The data in the report barely mentions terrorism, as it is dwarfed by the 5.2 million offences tracked that year. |
| 2017.11.29 | A spokesman for UK Prime Minister Theresa May condemned Donald Trump's decision to retweet anti-Muslim hate videos from British far-right leader Jayda Fransen, stating that UK citizens "overwhelmingly reject" the prejudiced rhetoric of the far-right. axios.com (See also Racism, Belief in Conspiracy Theories, Immigration) |
| 2017.12.04 | A divided U.S. Supreme Court let Donald Trump’s travel ban take full effect while legal challenges go forward, allowing the US to bar or restrict entry by people from six mostly Muslim countries, even if they have a relationship with a U.S.-based person or institution. bloomberg.com (See also Muslim Immigration Ban, Nationalism, Racism, Iran, Yemen, Syria, Supreme Court) |
| 2017.12.05 | Donald Trump plans to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and move the American Embassy there, upending nearly seven decades of American foreign policy and potentially destroying his efforts to broker peace between Israel and the Palestinians. nytimes.com (See also Unprecedented Actions, Israel, Jared Kushner) |
| 2018.01.21 | Even though the Trump administration released a report supposedly from the Department of Homeland Security saying that "73% of terrorists were ‘foreign-born," DHS analysts had nothing to do with the report or the conclusion. thedailybeast.com (See also Immigration, Nationalism, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Justice, Jeff Sessions) |
| 2018.02.03 | The Trump administration’s nominee to coordinate billions of dollars in assistance to migrants around the world has suggested in social-media posts that Islam is an inherently violent religion and has said Christians in some cases should receive preferential treatment when resettling from hostile areas. washingtonpost.com (See also Assaults on Civil Liberties) |
| 2018.02.15 | A federal appeals court ruled that Donald Trump's third attempt at a travel ban is likely unconstitutional, writing that it "continues to exhibit a primarily religious anti-Muslim objective." buzzfeed.com (See also Muslim Immigration Ban, Legal Issues, Nationalism) |
| 2018.03.15 | Ken Isaacs, the Trump administration's pick to head the United Nations organization that coordinates assistance to migrants worldwide regularly pushed anti-Muslim sentiment, including claims that Muslims were trying to impose Sharia law in the US. cnn.com (See also Racism) |
Assessments
- 2015.11.21 "Donald Trump's Horrifying Words About Muslims" (CNN)
"Donald Trump's words on Thursday detailing the revolting measures he's open to imposing on Muslim-Americans literally sent a shudder down my spine." - 2016.12.30 "What U.S. Muslims Fear From Trump" (Washington Post)
"People like me — ordinary Americans with Muslim names and ancestry from Muslim-majority countries — fear being put on a watchlist, barred entry into the United States, even banned because of who we are." - 2016.11.15 "Can the Muslim American Family Survive Trump?" (Al Jazeera)
"Over the course of the week, my daughter would ask if we were going to be banned from the country, pleading after my every reassurance, 'But how do you know?'" - 2016.11.22 "Why Trump Terrifies American Muslims" (Fortune)
"Members of President-elect Trump’s transition team and cabinet selections have said horrifying things about Islam and Muslims, grounded in pure racism and xenophobia." - 2016.11.22 "Donald Trump and the Rise of Anti-Muslim Violence" (The Atlantic)
"The irony of Trump’s anti-Muslim rhetoric is that the candidate who promises to be tough on terror may be making America not only less safe for American Muslims, but for all Americans."