Jeb Bush says almost no one believes his brother should be blamed for the 9/11 attacks.
Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush Sunday morning attacked Donald Trump for the GOP frontrunner’s statement that George W. Bush was president on 9/11.
“Does anybody actually blame my brother for the attacks on 9/11?,” Jeb Bush asked CNN’s Jake Tapper with great incredulity on “State of the Union.”Â
“If they do they’re totally marginalizing our society,” Bush claimed, without explanation as to how placing some blame on the man who ignored many warning signs is “marginalizing” society. “It’s what he did afterwards that matters. And I’m proud of him and so are a bunch of other people. You don’t have to have your last name be Bush to understand that.”
“Next week Mr. Trump is probably going to say that FDR was around when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor,” Bush added.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt was, in fact, the President when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor.
Jeb Bush is responding to a claim Donald Trump made on Friday suggesting George W. Bush might deserve some blame for the 9/11 attacks, but mostly just observing that Bush was president that day. Conservatives were outraged over Trump’s comments, leading to an excellent and amusing article at ThinkProgress, “Was George W. Bush President On 9/11?“
“When you talk about George Bush, I mean, say what you want, the World Trade Center came down during his time,†Trump said Friday. “He was president, OK? … Blame him, or don’t blame him, but he was president. The World Trade Center came down during his reign.â€
Raw Story’s David Edwards points out that towards the end of the interview, Jeb Bush “struggled … to explain how he could blame Hillary Clinton for the attacks in Benghazi while insisting that George W. Bush was blameless for the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.”
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Image: Screenshot via CNN
Hat tip: Talking Points Memo