Ex-CIA head: Trump ‘basically aiding’ the enemy

Former CIA Director Leon Panetta says Donald Trump’s rhetoric is helping America’s enemies.

“In 50 years in public life, I have never experienced a major-party candidate making the accusations and raising the innuendos that Donald Trump raised, particularly at this moment of crisis,” Panetta told MSNBC.

{mosads}“He’s not only accusing the president of the United States of treason and collaborating with the enemy, but in many ways what he’s saying about restricting Muslims from coming into this country, doing surveillance on Muslim mosques, is basically aiding and abetting the enemy at a time we ought to be unifying, working with the Muslim community, to try to protect against future attacks.”

Panetta slammed Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, for suggesting U.S. soldiers embezzled reconstruction funds lost during the Iraq War.

“I’m certainly not aware of anything like that,” said Panetta.

“And, you know, it just goes to show that I think Mr. Trump will say or do anything, about anything, and say ridiculous things in order to help rouse feelings in this country, divide Americans from one another, create doubt, create suspicion, divide us at a critical time, when very frankly we ought to be coming together.”

Forty-nine people were killed and 53 injured when a gunman opened fire Sunday at Pulse nightclub in Orlando in the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history.

Trump on Monday raised questions about President Obama’s refusal to attribute the attack to radical Islam.

Gunman Omar Mateen, 29, reportedly praised the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria before the attack.

Panetta endorsed Democrat Hillary Clinton for president in January.

He worked alongside Clinton in President Obama’s cabinet when Clinton was secretary of State and served as chief of staff for President Bill Clinton in the 1990s.