Kentucky Senator and Republican presidential candidate Rand Paul said that the US’ refugee needs “more scrutiny” and wondered why Saudi Arabia and Iran aren’t being asked to take refugees on Thursday’s “Hannity” on the Fox News Channel.
Rand stated, [relevant remarks begin around 2:20] “this is one of the reasons I opposed Rubio’s bill originally, on immigration, because I didn’t think there was enough scrutiny for those who might come and attack us. In the little town I live in in Kentucky, two refugees came from Iraq, and they tried to buy stinger missiles to attack us with. So, yeah, the refugee program has needed more scrutiny for a long time. So does the student visa program. Doesn’t mean I’m completely against it but for goodness sakes, we need to know who’s coming. One of the refugees that was flooding into Europe the other day, they had only his name, and that he was from Afghanistan. And my goodness, what are the odds that he might be somebody who’s going to attack the West? You need to know more about someone than just their name. He had no passport, and he was 19 years old. So, yes, absolutely we need more scrutiny.”
Rand added that a safe zone should be set up in Saudi Arabia, saying, “It annoys me to death, the Saudi Arabians that were primarily responsible for 9/11, they’re not doing anything. They keep pouring arms into the Syrian civil war. They’re — it’s like throwing gasoline on a fire, and then the Saudi Arabians do nothing to clean up the mess they’re part of creating.”
He further wondered, “Why doesn’t Iran step up? The president seems to have a conversation with Iran. Why doesn’t he ask Iran to take the Shiite Muslims that are fleeing? Why doesn’t Saudi Arabia take the Sunni Muslims that are fleeing? Because frankly, they’re part of problem but they never step up to be part of the solution.”
Rand concluded, “the next time Saudi Arabia comes asking for weapons, this needs to be the question. If Saudi Arabia’s not going to be — you saw what Saudi Arabia offered to do. They offered to build more mosques in Germany. I don’t think that’s necessarily the solution. Saudi Arabia gave hundreds of tons of weapons indiscriminately into the Syrian civil war. Many of these weapons, many of the weapons that ISIS has now, came from Saudi Arabia. So I do think Saudi Arabia is part of the problem, and someone needs to talk about it. And before we have refugees coming to America, I want to know why Saudi Arabia who ostensibly is our ally, why they’re not willing to take any refugees. That question should be directly asked of Saudi Arabia.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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