Donald Trump deflected a question about whether he still supports banning all Muslims from entering the United States in the second presidential debate Sunday, saying that he supports “extreme vetting.”
“The Muslim ban is something that has morphed into an extreme vetting,” he said. “We’re going into areas like Syria where they’re coming in by the 10s of thousands.”
But the press release announcing the proposal remains on Trump’s website.
Trump first called for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States, arguing that Muslim immigrants and refugees are a threat to national security last December. He doubled down on the proposal after the mass shooting in June at a nightclub in Orlando, Fla., which was carried out by a U.S. Citizen born in New York. Clinton has responded by criticizing Trump for sowing division and threatening religious liberty.