Trump proposes racial profiling as a tactic 'to start thinking about'

Republicans struggled to respond to the worst mass shooting in US history on Sunday, as Donald Trump proposed profiling of Muslims by law enforcement and members of Congress gave mixed messages about a gun control vote looming on Monday.

“I think profiling is something that we’re going to have to start thinking about as a country,” Trump told CBS’s Face the Nation. “You look at Israel and you look at others and they do it successfully.

“You know, I hate the concept of profiling. But we have to start using common sense and we have to use, you know, we have to use our heads.”

He then said racial or religious profiling was “not the worst thing to do”, repeated his call to surveil mosques and added: “They’re doing it in France.”

In the wake of terror attacks, France has enacted controversial surveillance laws, increasing tensions with its large Muslim population. In March, security forces claimed to have foiled an “advanced” plot after raids in a Paris suburb.

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee was more noncommittal earlier in his CBS interview, saying he did not know whether Muslims who legally bought weapons and ammunition should be subject to extra scrutiny from security agencies.

After the Orlando attack which killed 49 people in Orlando last week, a shooting deemed both a hate crime and terror attack by Barack Obama, Trump once again proposed banning all Muslims from entering the US. The shooter in Orlando legally bought his weapons and was a US citizen, born to Afghan immigrants in the same city as Trump. After the Orlando attack, Trump once again proposed banning all Muslims from entering the US.

Earlier on Sunday, Trump said he supported proposals to ban gun sales to people on terror and no-fly watchlists. The proposal has been endorsed by Obama, Hillary Clinton and other Democrats, and a version of it is slated for a vote on Monday in the Senate.

“I’d like to see that,” Trump told ABC. “It’s just simpler.”

The candidate said he understood Republican concerns about civil liberties, in that security agencies can be secretive and arbitrary in their use of such lists.

“It could be that people are on there that shouldn’t be on,” he said. But the businessman sided with the president in principle, saying: “We have to make sure that people that are terrorists or have even an inclination toward terrorism cannot buy weapons, guns.”

He added that he intended to speak with leaders of the National Rife Association, the powerful pro-gun lobbying group that has endorsed him, about his ideas. Those leaders have said they would be glad to speak with Trump, but were blunt on Sunday in their general opposition to any new gun control measures.

In an interview with CBS, NRA president Wayne LaPierre said any attention to guns was meant by Democrats as a distraction.

“They want to cover their butts and not talk about [terrorism],” he said. “You can’t save the country with politics.”

LaPierre insisted that a ban on assault weapons would not stop or even create obstacles for “bad guys” in search of firearms, and argued that laws simply could not keep weapons out of the hands of dangerous people.

“What we’re doing with this debate on the Hill right now, it’s like they’re trying to stop a freight train with a piece of Kleenex,” he said. “Laws didn’t stop them in Boston, laws didn’t stop them in San Bernardino, where you had every type of gun control law you can have, and they didn’t stop them in Paris, where people can’t even own guns.”

The NRA’s chief lobbyist, Chris Cox, was less vociferous but equally as adamant. He argued on ABC’s This Week that watchlists are faulty tools, citing Nelson Mandela’s time on one as an example. But he also hinted that there may be room to compromise.

“The NRA’s position is that terrorist should not be able to buy firearms, legally or illegally,” Cox said.

Cox said the NRA supported a Republican proposal that would delay gun purchases by people on the terrorism watchlist, giving the FBI 72 hours to investigate and provide “probable cause” to block sales to that person. That person could then challenge the ban.

But both LaPierre and Cox said they disagreed on one point with Trump, who claimed this week that weapons in the hands of clubgoers could have stopped mass murder last Sunday.

“No one thinks people should go into a nightclub, drinking, and carrying a firearm,” Cox said. “That’s not controversial, that’s common sense.”

LaPierre made a similar remark but added a dark and vague warning about unknown threats.

“I don’t think you should have firearms where people are drinking,” he said, “but I’ll tell you this: every American needs to start having a security plan to protect ourselves because they are coming.”

An armed police officer was working security for the Pulse nightclub last Sunday when the attack began, and immediately engaged the gunman in a firefight. The shooter barricaded himself in a bathroom and continued to kill people.

Republicans in Congress gave mixed signals about what would be possible on Monday.

“We can tighten up the laws some,” Alabama senator Jeff Sessions told Fox News Sunday, “but I don’t believe it will have a great effect on America’s national security.” On CNN, he added: “I’m open to the details.”

An early supporter of Trump, Sessions also suggested a watered down version of the businessman’s proposed ban of Muslims from entering the US.

“We should slow down, let’s kind of pause and analyze where the threats are coming from,” he said, proposing the creation of a “database” of people.

A Republican more skeptical of Trump, House homeland security committee chair Michael McCaul, repeated recent suggestions to ABC that not even a watchlist measure would pass in Congress, due to civil liberties concerns.

“If you’re on there on mere suspicion or a hunch and denied a constitutional right, I have a problem with that, too,” he said.

Attorney general Loretta Lynch toured the talk shows, representing the Obama administration. She did not express support for the 72-hour proposal. On ABC, she declined to discuss specifics of the watchlists or to provide an estimate of how many people were on them.

“We don’t provide those exact numbers,” she said, twice.

Senator Chris Murphy, a leader of the push for gun reform whose career has been defined by the 2012 mass shooting in Sandy Hook, Connecticut that killed 20 children and six adults, conceded that Democrats were unlikely to get 60 votes to close background check loopholes – a measure that at least 70% of Americans consistently support, according to polls.

He nonetheless expressed hope about widespread support for action.

“We should be making our gun laws less full of Swiss cheese holes to prevent future mass killings,” he told ABC. “This has to be broader than just responding to what happened three days ago.”

The Justice Department will on Monday release partial transcripts of the Orlando gunman’s calls to a 911 emergency operator, in which he pledged allegiance to the Islamic State. Lynch said that the FBI was interviewing the shooter’s family, former coworkers and anyone who knew him, and investigating his history of erratic and aggressive behavior.

The FBI opened two investigations into the suspect in 2013 and 2014, but were unable to find evidence that he had links to terror groups, and closed the inquiries.