President Donald Trump said his plan to take executive action to suspend immigration "is not the Muslim ban."
"It's countries that have tremendous terror. It's countries that we're going to be spelling out in a little while in the same speech. And it's countries that people are going to come in and cause us tremendous problems," Trump told ABC News anchor David Muir.
"Our country has enough problems without allowing people to come in who, in many cases or in some cases, are looking to do tremendous destruction."
The president said he would be revealing the list of countries that would be banned soon.
"You'll be very thrilled. You're looking at people that come in, in many cases, in some cases with evil intentions. I don't want that. They're ISIS. They're coming under false pretenses. I don't want that," Trump said.
"I'm going to be the president of a safe country," he added.
Trump said he would set up safe zones in Syria, and disagreed with European countries allowing refugees to come in, which he said was a "tremendous mistake… it's a disaster what's happening over there. I don't want that to happen here."
He said that the refugees that have already been allowed into the U.S. has led to more work for the FBI. "The FBI is investigating more people than ever before having to do with terror. They—and it's from the group of people that came in."
Trump said certain countries would be banned entirely, but for others, "we're going to have extreme vetting in all cases. And I mean extreme. And we're not letting people in if we think there's even a little chance of some problem."
When asked if he was concerned about causing anger among Muslims, Trump replied: "There's plenty of anger right now. How can you have more?"
Undocumented immigrants should worry less about being deported, unless they have criminal records, said Trump and "they shouldn't be very worried. I do have a big heart. We're going to take care of everybody… Where you have great people that are here that have done a good job, they should be far less worried."
Trump's newly sworn-in Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly will focus on undocumented immigrants with criminal records.
"Those people have to be worried because they're getting out. We're going to get them out. We're going to get them out fast. General Kelly is — I've given that as his number one priority."
An executive order is expected this week and would include a pause on accepting refugees in the U.S. and an indefinite ban on those fleeing Syria, as well as suspensions on visas for people from predominantly Muslim countries, according to a draft obtained by The Associated Press.
© 2024 Newsmax. All rights reserved.