Trump Always Has the Saudis' Back

Peter Bergen wrote an article for CNN on the recent attacks in Florida and Trump's continued support of the Saudi Arabian regime.

(CNN)The FBI is treating Friday's shooting at the Naval Air Station in Pensacola, Florida, in which three US sailors were killed as an "act of terror."

This makes the alleged shooter, Saudi Air Force officer Mohammed Alshamrani, the first foreign national to carry out a lethal terrorist attack in the US since 9/11.

Every other lethal jihadist terrorist attack in the United States since 9/11 has been carried out by a US citizen or legal permanent resident, according to New America, a research institution.

President Donald Trump's reaction to the attack in Pensacola was uncharacteristically subdued, and he hasn't characterized it as act of terrorism even though the FBI is treating it as such. Trump spoke to Saudi Arabia's King and to its Crown Prince and said, "They are devastated by what took place in Pensacola. And I think they're going to help out the families very greatly."

Do this thought experiment: What if the Pensacola shooter wasn't a Saudi but instead a national of a country such as Yemen that is on the Trump "travel ban" list of seven largely Muslim-majority countries whose citizens are subject to "extreme vetting." Trump would be crowing about his travel ban, as he has in recent weeks when he has invoked it several times at campaign rallies, claiming that it has made the US safe from terrorists.