Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

Mike Pence Claims Donald Trump No Longer Backs Ban on Muslims

Donald Trump has backed away from a total ban on Muslims entering the United States, vice presidential running mate Mike Pence said on Thursday, a shift from one of the Republican presidential candidate’s most provocative proposals.

Trump’s call last December for “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States” followed an Islamic State-inspired mass shooting in San Bernardino, California, by a husband-and-wife team.

Critics have called the proposed ban discriminatory and probably a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of freedom of religion, and Democrats have used Trump’s policy to declare him a bigot.

In recent months, Trump has said he would suspend immigration from countries where Islamist militants are active but has left vague as to whether this amounted to a narrowing or an expansion of his original policy position.

Pence said in a round of television interviews that if elected on Nov. 8, Trump would suspend immigration from “countries that have been compromised by terrorism.”

Asked if this amounted to a ban on Muslims, Pence said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” show: “Of course not.”

On CNN’s “New Day,” Pence was asked why, given that he had been against the ban before becoming Trump’s running mate, he was not opposing it now.”

“Well, because it’s not Donald Trump’s position now,” replied Pence.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.