Donald Trump is getting an unearned boost for his own political agenda based on a recent terror attack, according to a report.
Shamsud-Din Jabbar was an American citizen and a U.S. Army veteran who rented a pick-up and rammed it into a group of people in New Orleans, killing more than a dozen of them.
Trump seized on an early false report, which was later retracted, that suggested Jabbar might have been an illegal immigrant. The president-elect made multiple posts about border security in the wake of the terrorist act, and never clarified those comments.
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Now, Republicans are trying "to exploit New Orleans attack to push through Trump agenda," according to The Guardian, which added that Trump loyalists are making a "baseless link between attack and US border" in order to argue that "cabinet nominees must be urgently ratified."
"Republicans in the US Senate are attempting to exploit the New Year’s Day attack that killed 14 victims in New Orleans, while injuring dozens more, to push through Donald Trump’s most controversial cabinet nominations and rocket-charge the incoming president’s anti-immigration agenda – despite the fact that the attacker was a US citizen born and raised in east Texas," the article states. "Several Senate Republicans appeared on Sunday’s political shows to call for an urgent approval of the most contentious of Trump’s cabinet selections who are facing a tough confirmation process. They include Kash Patel, chosen by Trump for FBI director; Pete Hegseth for defense secretary; and Tulsi Gabbard for director of national intelligence."
The report goes on to claim GOP lawmakers are arguing that "any delay in confirmation of the controversial cabinet picks would damage US national security."
"Lindsey Graham, the Republican senator from South Carolina who is a leading Trump loyalist, said he would vote for all the president-elect’s nominees," the article states, quoting Graham as saying, "Do them now, do them quick, get them all done... We are under attack here – we are at war."