COLUMBUS – Two prominent Ohio Republicans are blasting President Barack Obama’s strategy for defeating the Islamic State and the one who wants the job in the White house says a tactic to make it harder for suspected terrorists to buy guns is a mistake.
In a rare prime-time address from the Oval Office Sunday night, the president told Americans “The threat from terrorism is real, but we will overcome it.”
The speech follows last week’s shootings in San Bernardino, California that killed 14 people and wounded 21. The husband and wife who carried out the shooting appear to have been inspired by Islamic extremists.
“The two of them had gone down the dark path of radicalization, embracing a perverted interpretation of Islam that calls for war against America and the West,” he said, imploring Americans to not turn against Muslims at home, saying the Islamic State is driven by a desire to spark a war between the West and Islam.
Ohio Gov. John Kasich (right), a GOP presidential candidate, said Obama’s strategy is inadequate.
“Without taking the fight to ISIS on the ground, ISIS won’t be defeated,” he said in a statement issued after the address. “Since February I’ve been calling for a coalition to do that. We must stop delaying and do it. We delayed in helping the Syrian rebels and look where it got us, and when we decided to act it was too little. Bolder action across the board is needed because our way of life is what’s at stake. “
Kasich also criticized the president’s call on Congress to close a legal loophole that allows people whose names are on the terrorist watch list to buy guns in most cases.
“When terrorists threaten us, our response can’t be to target our own constitutional rights,” Kasich said. “Our rights aren’t the problem, our unwillingness to act to defeat extremists is the problem.”
U.S. Sen. Rob Portman (left) called the Obama administration’s campaign against the Islamic State “fundamentally flawed.”
“This is the same strategy that treated ISIS as a JV team, claimed ISIS was ‘contained’ the day of the Paris attacks, and then said that there were no threats of attacks on U.S. soil,” he said in a statement issued Sunday night.
“This attack is another reminder of the need to review our security vetting procedures for visa applicants, as it now appears that the female terrorist was able to obtain a visa to enter the U.S. It’s also a reminder that we must not fight this enemy with one hand tied behind our back and we must ensure that we have every capability possible to stop these types of attacks. That includes considering the renewal of intelligence gathering programs that expired in November,” Portman said.