After an improvised explosive device detonated inside a crowded London Tube train, President Donald Trump continued his hip-fire tactics and immediately assumed the attack was perpetrated by a “loser terrorist” who was “in the sights of Scotland Yard.” Trump then used the attack push for his travel ban on Muslim-majority countries in a series of tweets. However Metropolitan Police and British Prime Minister Theresa May were not thrilled about Trump’s quick assumptions.
“Another attack in London by a loser terrorist.These are sick and demented people who were in the sights of Scotland Yard. Must be proactive!” Trump tweeted.
“Loser terrorists must be dealt with in a much tougher manner.The internet is their main recruitment tool which we must cut off & use better!” he wrote in his next tweet.
“We don’t even know who the suspects are so it’s a bit difficult to say,” a Metropolitan Police told The Independent. “It’s just speculation.”
During a meeting of the government’s Cobra emergency committee, Britain’s prime minister said, “I never think it’s helpful for anybody to speculate on what is an ongoing investigation.”
Police have not yet named a suspect, The Independent reported.
This is hardly the first time Trump has made evidence-free leaps to his desired conclusions. He incorrectly labeled a shooting in the Philippines as a terrorist attack in June, and never corrected his words. In that same time period there was also a terrorist attack in London, and Trump proceeded to bash the city’s mayor by taking his words out of context, and also pushed for his so-called travel ban.
Conveniently, Trump has remained silent specifically on terror attacks where Muslims were in harms way, and sent his aides to go on television and instead insist that the administration is waiting for all of the facts to be known until a statement is made. This is most certainly by design.
In the video above, Salon’s U.K. contributing correspondent Adrian Smith breaks down what London commuters experienced during and after the explosion.