Donald Trump doubles down on comments that blame 9/11 attacks on George W. Bush's immigration policies, For a third day in a row, Republican front-runner Donald Trump doubled down Sunday on his controversial comments that George W. Bush was to blame for Sept. 11, 2001, claiming that his own hardline immigration proposals would have prevented the terrorist attacks."I am extremely, extremely tough on illegal immigration. I am extremely tough on people coming into this country," Trump said on "Fox News Sunday."
"I believe that if I were running things, I doubt that those people would have been in the country," the bombastic billionaire added, referring to the hijackers who stayed in the U.S. illegally.
Trump has repeatedly hammered 2016 competitor Jeb Bush for the national security record of his brother, former President George W. Bush — a strategy he relied on once again Sunday.
"I'm not blaming George Bush," Trump said. "But I don't want Jeb to say 'my brother kept us safe.’”
“We lost 3,000 people, it as one of the greatest — probably the greatest catastrophe ever in this country," he said.
Trump also took aim at Bush on Twitter for his brother's decision to invade Iraq in 2003.
"Jeb, why did your brother attack and destabilize the Middle East by attacking Iraq when there were no weapons of mass destruction? Bad info?" Trump wrote on the social media network.Bush, for his part, defended his brother Sunday against Trump's Sept. 11 insults, explaining that the former President simply "responded to a crisis, and he did it as you would hope a President would do."
"He united the country," Bush said on CNN's "State of the Union." "He organized our country, and he kept us safe. And there's no denying that. The great majority of Americans believe that."
"I don't know why he keeps bringing this up," Bush said of Trump's Sept. 11 barbs. "It doesn't show that he's not a serious person as it relates to being commander-in-chief and being the architect of a foreign policy.
"Across the spectrum of foreign policy, Mr. Trump talks about things as though he's still on 'The Apprentice,'" Bush said. "This is just another example of the lack of seriousness.
"And this is a serious time. We're under grave threats again, and I think we need a President with a steady hand," he added.
"It looks as though he doesn't — he's not taking the responsibility, the possibility of being President of the United States really seriously,” Bush said. "For him, it looks as though it's ... he's an actor playing a role of the candidate for President" Bush said.
Trump, the presumptive Republican front-runner, and Bush, who is trailing in national polls, have been trading insults for weeks as the battle for their party's nomination has intensified.But the tone took a particularly sour turn Friday when Trump, in an interview with Bloomberg News, jostled George W. Bush about Sept. 11.
"When you talk about George Bush, I mean, say what you want, the World Trade Center came down during his time," Trump said on Bloomberg TV Friday.
"Hold on, you can't blame George Bush for that," the stunned anchor Stephanie Ruhle responded.
"He was President, OK?" the GOP front-runner then added. "Blame him, or don't blame him, but he was President. The World Trade Center came down during his reign."
Trump's crack sent shockwaves through the Republican ranks, and drew Bush's brother Jeb into the still-occurring melee.
"How pathetic for @realdonaldtrump to criticize the president for 9/11," Jeb Bush tweeted Friday night.
"No @JebBush, you're pathetic for saying nothing happened during your brother's term when the World Trade Center was attacked and came down," Trump tweeted moments later.
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