Trump Would 'Strongly Consider' Closing Radical Mosques in the US

GOP front-runner Donald Trump said he'd hate to close down radical mosques in the United States if he were president, but it is something that he would "strongly consider" because of "some of the ideas and some of the hatred, the absolute hatred" that is coming from them.

"You're going to have to watch and study the mosques because a lot of talk is going on at the mosques," the New York billionaire told MSNBC's "Morning Joe" show. "In the old days, meaning a while ago, we had great surveillance going in and around mosques in New York City and I understand our mayor totally cut that out."

In France, there has been some talk about shutting down mosques following a series of terror attacks on Friday in Paris, and Trump said it is a "mistake" that New York City is no longer watching its mosques.

And, he said that there is "already hatred," when it comes to backlash from such a move.

"It's embedded," Trump said. "It is beyond belief; the hatred [is] greater than anybody understands, and it is already there."

Trump further told the show that if he were president, "we probably wouldn't be [having] the problem we are right now," because ISIS-controlled oil sites that are financing the insurgents would already have been taken out with bombs.

"The other problem is, we have a president that doesn't and won't use the term radical Islamic terrorism," said Trump. "Hillary Clinton didn't want to use the term the other day in the debate, which was a ridiculous and terrible debate, a joke. All three of them refused to use the term radical Islam being terrorism. They just can't say it."

And without defining the problem, "you're never going to solve the problem," said Trump. "You'd almost think they have the terrorists coming out from Sweden. The problem is obvious."

Trump also said it's obvious which countries are sending money to ISIS, and that could be tracked and stopped if "we have intelligent people leading our country, but we don't."

"Tremendous money is pouring into ISIS and other terrorist groups through very wealthy countries that we think are our friends, and they're not our friends," he said.

Trump further said he'd be willing to send at least 10,000 troops to the Middle East to fight ISIS, but also other countries should take part in the fight.

"I would tell them it's time for to you get out and fight and time for you to put up your troops or put your so-called boots on the ground or put your people on the ground, because we're not going to continue to do this, but in the meantime we can do tremendous damage," he said.

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