John Bolton As National Security Advisor Should Scare Muslims

John Bolton As National Security Advisor Should Scare Muslims

John Bolton As National Security Advisor Should Scare Muslims
GAGE SKIDMORE is licensed under CC BY 2.0
John Bolton Has A History Of Islamophbia.

It seemed like the anti-Muslim government positions and rhetoric in the Trump Adminstration could not get worse. Then John Bolton was nominated to National Security Advisor to replace HR McMaster.

John Bolton As National Security Advisor Should Scare Muslims[/tweetthis]

Why should John Bolton be frightening for Muslims in the United States and Globally?

It is first important to understand the role of National Security Advisor. Basically, the job is a gatekeeper for the president about security matters. Bolton will take information on security threats and then determine how and what to present to the president. He will give advice on what to do. The president will give orders and then Bolton will make sure that the national security apparatus of the United States correctly implements this. So, in effect, he controls the information going to Trump and then makes sure Trump’s positions are being followed.

So how does Bolton talk of Muslims? Badly. He has clear alliances with Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller, who the Southern Poverty Law Center called the “most unhinged anti-Muslim ideologues in the United States.” He has been connected to the Gatestone Institute, an organization that makes false statements such as that Muslim refugees rape and spread disease and that Muslims have stopped the ability to travel to certain parts of European cities.

Those are not the only conspiracy theories he has promoted. He has stated that Obama was a secret Muslim and that the United States government had been infiltrated by members of the Muslim Brotherhood.

The problems with Bolton don’t stop at the U.S. border. He argued that the United States should bomb Iran. He has made numerous lies about foreign policy. He claimed that the “Axis of Evil” of Iran, Iraq, and North Korea were funneling weapons to each other. He stated that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. When a leading expert at the U.S. State Department pointed out to him there was no evidence to support Iraq having a biological weapons program Bolton verbally attacked him and tried to get him fired.

Which is Bolton’s leadership style. Multiple subordinates have come forward to report that Bolton harassed them. One stated that Bolton chased him around a hotel screaming “like a madman.” For someone with so much administrative control, the combination of a disregard of the truth and willingness to bully his viewpoint throughis dangerous.

These reasons may be why the Council of American-Muslim Relations Executive Director Nihad Awad called Bolton “the last person who should be entrusted with this critically-important position.”

There is a clear link between the anti-Muslim rhetoric of the Trump administration and the rise of violence against Muslim Americans in the United States. The language of leaders gives permission for individuals to justify their actions. There is a reason why you see videos of people saying both pro-Trump and anti-Muslim phrases in the same breath. Bolton has shown himself to advance his own agenda and ignore the facts. For a person who could lead America into war against a Muslim country, or influence how Trump sees the Muslim population at-large this is truly a terrifying future.

Resources

Follow the Conversation on Twitter