When George W. Bush Defended Muslim Americans

On September 17, 2001, George W.

Bush visited the Islamic Center of Washington, D.C.

Six days had passed since the 9/11 attacks, and in that time, reports of harassment and violence against Muslim Americans had surged.

In Salt Lake City, a man attempted to burn down a Pakistani American restaurant.

Near Phoenix, a gunman murdered a Sikh man he thought was Muslim.

Community leaders at the center told Bush their stories that morning.

The president listened.

Then, in front of the mosque’s intricate tiles and graceful arches, the country’s most prominent Christian politician spoke.

He addressed the terrorist attacks: “These acts of violence against innocents violate the fundamental tenets of the Islamic faith.” Citing a passage from the Quran, Bush described Islam as a religion in which “billions of people find comfort and solace and peace.” He then discussed Muslims’ being targeted, stressing that people “who feel like they can intimidate our fellow citizens to take out their anger don’t represent the best of America—they represent the worst of humankind.” Bush’s message at the Islamic Center, which he echoed numerous times in post-9/11 remarks, now feels like a remnant from a bygone era.

As my colleague Jonathan Chait recently argued , antagonistic, vicious rhetoric about Islam has become more and more widespread on the right.

Donald Trump said in the Oval Office last month, in reference to the upcoming midterm elections, that “we have jihadists being elected all over the place.” Also last month, Representative Nancy Mace of South Carolina wrote on social media that “every single Muslim holding public office in America” is “a threat to both national security and our republic.” When asked about her comment, Mace replied, “I don’t want to hear the call to prayer five times a day in an American city.

I think it’s wrong; it’s not our values.” [ Read: The man who refused to sit on the sidelines ] Many Republican elected officials have cast their vilification of Islam as a defense of Christianity.

“Muslims don’t belong in American society,” Representative Andy Ogles of Tennessee posted on social media in March; the next day, he decried the “importation of Islam” because “Christianity is the answer.

Always.” In a June statement, Representative Keith Self of Texas said that “Christian values form the foundation of our nation” and described Sharia—a set of religious guidelines for Muslims—as “wholly incompatible with the rule of law in the United States.” Some people on the right have made Bush himself an object of scorn for the way he spoke about Islam after 9/11.