U.S. & MuslimsTrump Calls for preventing all Muslims, including immigrants and tourists, from entering U.S.

In what must be seen as an extraordinary rhetorical escalation even for a presidential candidate not known for nuance and subtlety, Donald J. Trump on Monday called for the United States to prevent all Muslims, without exception, from entering the United States until the country’s leaders and security agencies can “figure out what is going on.”

Trump said that a recent poll shows that a sizable segment of the Muslim population has “great hatred towards Americans.”

“Without looking at the various polling data, it is obvious to anybody the hatred is beyond comprehension,” the Washington Post reportsTrump to have said. “Where this hatred comes from and why we will have to determine. Until we are able to determine and understand this problem and the dangerous threat it poses, our country cannot be the victims of horrendous attacks by people that believe only in Jihad, and have no sense of reason or respect for human life,” he said.

A spokeswoman for Trump told the Post that the statements were authentic. According to the spokeswoman, when a reporter asked Trump what prompted him to call for a total ban on Muslims, Trump said, “death.”

Trump’s campaign manager Corey Lewandowski told the Associated Press that the ban would apply to “everybody,” including both immigrants and tourists.

Immigration law, security, and policy experts expressed their shock and dismay at Trump’s proposal.

“This is just so antithetical to the history of the United States,” said Nancy Morawetz, a professor of clinical law at New York University School of Law, who specializes in immigration, told the New York Times. “It’s unbelievable to have a religious test for admission into the country.”

She added: “I cannot recall any historical precedent for denying immigration based on religion.”

Morawetz said that the United States has long regretted policies that banned the immigration of Chinese at the end of nineteenth century. “It’s a very sad chapter in American immigration history that we would think is behind us today.”

Trump has a record of intemperate statements on the issue of the United States and Muslims. He has called for the government to monitor mosques, and has refused to back down from his earlier proposal to create a special database which will include the names of all Muslim Americans – and have Muslim Americans’ religion noted on their identity documents (he did not specify which ones). Trump, who was leading “birther” — claiming that President Obama was not born in the United States – has also made several cryptic and conspiratorial comments about how Obama was conducting the war against ISIS,  hinting that there was “something going on” with Obama and ISIS that Americans should, but were not, aware of.

Ibrahim Hooper, national communications director at the Council on American-Islamic Relations, told the Post: “Oh, my goodness. One has to wonder what Donald Trump will say next as he ramps up his anti-Muslim bigotry. Where is there left for him to go? Are we talking internment camps? Are we talking the final solution to the Muslim question? I feel like I’m back in the 1930s.”

Hooper said he was especially worried about the premeditated nature of Trump’s statement.

“He feels perfectly okay saying this,” said Hooper. “It’s not an open mic moment, where he has to walk something back. This was a statement from his campaign. They had to believe that this would be well received by his supporters. We’ve always had anti-Muslim bigots, but they’ve always been at the fringes of society. Now they want to lead it. In saner times, his campaign would be over. In insane times, his campaign can gain support. And that’s why he put it out.”