TRUMP, PENCE, MATTIS, SESSIONS FAIL TO NAME “ISLAMIC TERRORISM” IN 9/11 REMARKS
September 11, 2017
republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
The Trump administration: now digitally McMastered.
âInstead of naming the enemy, Trump seemingly went out of his way to
use other descriptors in his speech, including âterrorists who attacked
us,â âbarbaric forces of evil and destruction,â âhorrible, horrible
enemies,â âenemies of all civilized people,â and âenemies like weâve
never seen before.’â
Thatâs great, Mr. President, but you will find it impossible to
defeat these horrible, horrible enemies without identifying and working
to devise ways to confront their motivating ideology. Thatâs what you
seemed to be promising to do when you rebuked Obama and Hillary Clinton
for not daring to say âradical Islamic terrorism.â Now you have joined
them. You were right the first time.
â9/11/2017: Trump, Pence, Mattis, Sessions Fail to Name âRadical Islamic Terrorism,ââ by Aaron Klein, Breitbart, September 11, 2017:
NEW YORK â On the sixteenth anniversary of the September
11, 2001, Islamic terrorist attacks, President Donald Trump did not once
mention the terms âradical Islamâ or âIslamic terrorismâ during a
commemoration ceremony at the Pentagon.Those phrases were also not mentioned in speeches today by other
Trump administration senior officials, including Vice President Mike
Pence, Defense Secretary James Mattis, and Attorney General Jeff
Sessions.Instead of naming the enemy, Trump seemingly went out of his way to
use other descriptors in his speech, including âterrorists who attacked
us,â âbarbaric forces of evil and destruction,â âhorrible, horrible
enemies,â âenemies of all civilized people,â and âenemies like weâve
never seen before.âSimilarly, Pence, speaking at the Flight 93 National Memorial in
Shanksville, Pennsylvania, referred to the scourge as âevil terroristsâ
and âglobal terrorism.â Pence did mention âthe barbarians known as
ISIS,â calling the global jihadist group by its acronym instead of the
Islamic State.Mattis, addressing the same Pentagon memorial as Trump, outwardly
minimized the Islamic motivations of the terrorists by calling them
âmaniacs disguised in false religious garb.â He referred to âattackers
perpetrating murderâ on that fateful day, not even using the words
âterroristâ or âterrorism.âSessions perhaps came closest to prescribing a religious ideology,
calling out âextremistsâ who âseek to impose their speech codes, their
religion, their theocracy.ââFor these extremists, itâs more than religion; itâs ideology,â he stated. âWe have no choice but to defend against it.â
But Sessions did not mention a specific religion and did not expound upon which ideology the terrorists maintain.
When speaking of common threads among terrorists, Sessions also failed to mention the one major thread of Islam when he stated:
While the threats we face are diverse and evolving,
terrorist ideologies have one thing in common: their disregard for the
dignity of human life and they share an obsession with forcing everyone
into their twisted ideology. And the terrorists know they canât persuade
people using reason, so they use coercion and intimidation. They seek
acquiescence and inaction.Acting Department of Homeland Security Secretary Elaine Duke released
a brief statement that referred to the 9/11 radical Islamic jihadist
perpetrators as âterrorists.âTrumpâs reluctance to name the actual enemy contrasts with speeches
he gave in the past, including during the 2016 presidential campaign, in
which he repeatedly utilized the phrase âradical Islamic terrorism.ââAmerica was under attack,â stated Trump at Mondayâs Pentagon memorial, a passive tone that did not specify who the attackers were.
âToday, our entire nation grieves with you and with every family of
those 2,977 innocent souls who were murdered by terrorists 16 years
ago,â he stated.âThe terrorists who attacked us thought they could incite fear and
weaken our spirit. But America cannot be intimidated, and those who try
will soon join the long list of vanquished enemies who dared to test our
mettle.âTrump went on to use various other terms to describe the enemy:
In the years after September 11, more than five million
young men and women have joined the ranks of our great military to
defend our country against barbaric forces of evil and destruction.
American forces are relentlessly pursuing and destroying the enemies of
all civilized people, ensuring â and these are horrible, horrible
enemies, enemies like weâve never seen before â but weâre ensuring they
never again have a safe haven to launch attacks against our country. We
are making plain to these savage killers that there is no dark corner
beyond our reach, no sanctuary beyond our grasp, and nowhere to hide
anywhere on this very large earth.âŚ
So here at this memorial, with hearts both sad and determined, we
honor every hero who keeps us safe and free, and we pledge to work
together, to fight together, and to overcome together every enemy and
obstacle thatâs ever in our path.Pence did quote a previous statement from Trump about terroristsâ
âradical ideologyâ but, like the other administration officials
speaking, did not say what that ideology was:But under the leadership of President Donald Trump, as
our commander-in-chief, our armed forces have ISIS on the run in Iraq
and Syria, and we will not rest or relent until we hunt down and destroy
them at their source. Some four weeks ago, President Trump expressed
the full commitment of the United States to, in his words, âdestroy
terrorist organizations and the radical ideology that drives them.The uniform lack of the mention of radical Islamic terrorism from the
administration Monday comes after previous reports that H.R. McMaster,
Trumpâs embattled national security adviser, has petitioned against
using the phrase.In February, CNN cited
a source inside a National Security Council meeting quoting McMaster as
saying that use of the phrase âradical Islamic terrorismâ is unhelpful
in working with allies to fight terrorism.In May, McMaster spoke on ABCâs This Week
about whether Trump would use the phrase âradical Islamic terrorismâ in
a speech that the president was about to give in Saudi Arabia. âThe
president will call it whatever he wants to call it,â McMaster said.
âBut I think itâs important that, whatever we call it, we recognize that
[extremists] are not religious people. And, in fact, these enemies of
all civilizations, what they want to do is to cloak their criminal
behavior under this false idea of some kind of religious war.ââŚ