Pollster Dalia Mogahed said on Wednesday that she would like to know why white supremacist and white nationalist figures are attracted to President Trump’s policies.
“I’m going to ask a different question, which is not has he distanced himself enough? But why is he so attractive to them?” Mogahed, director of research at the Institute of Social Policy and Understanding (ISPU), told Hill.TV’s Jamal Simmons on Wednesday.
“That is the question that I want answered. Why are his policies and his rhetoric so attractive that they are constantly holding him up as an inspiration where he constantly has to disavow or not disavow?” she continued.
“Whether he’s disavowing or not is actually a secondary issue. My biggest issue is why did the New Zealand shooter call President Trump a source of inspiration? That’s the problem,” she said.
One of the suspects in the two fatal New Zealand mosque shootings in March wrote in a manifesto that he supported Trump as a symbol of renewed white identity and common purpose.”
Trump sharply condemned the attack in March.
“My warmest sympathy and best wishes goes out to the people of New Zealand after the horrible massacre in the Mosques,” he tweeted. “49 innocent people have so senselessly died, with so many more seriously injured. The U.S. stands by New Zealand for anything we can do. God bless all!”
Trump and his administration have regularly been blamed for a rise in white nationalism in the United States.
After white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups battled counter-protesters in Charlottesville, Va., in August 2017, the president was criticized for saying there were good people on both sides of the battle.
Former KKK Grand Wizard David Duke before the Charlottesville rally said the groups attending that rally were seeking to take their country back and “fulfill the promises of Donald Trump.”
— Julia Manchester
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