Kellyanne Conway Invents The ‘Bowling Green Massacre’ To Defend Trump’s Muslim Ban
Hot on the heels of her “alternative facts” line, President Trump’s adviser Kellyanne Conway has used the ‘Bowling Green Massacre’ as a justification for the so-called ‘Muslim ban’ – which never happened.
The former Trump campaign manager went on MSNBC’s Hardball on Thursday night to defend the president’s decision to temporarily ban passport-holders from seven majority-Muslim countries and referenced a “massacre” – she claimed was carried out by two Iraqi refugees.
.@KellyannePolls says that 2 Iraqi refugees “were the masterminds behind the Bowling Green massacre.”
(There was no such massacre.) pic.twitter.com/sD3Nnb5xfE— Joe Sonka (@joesonka) February 3, 2017
Conway said: “I bet it’s brand new information to people that President Obama had a six-month ban on the Iraqi refugee program after two Iraqis came here to this country, were radicalized and they were the masterminds behind the Bowling Green massacre.
Blaming the media, she continued: “Most people don’t know that because it didn’t get covered.”
While Chris Matthews didn’t question Conway further about this supposed incident, Twitter did and another grilling of the Trump administration ensued.
Dear @KellyannePolls,
What is the “Bowling Green Massacre?” None of us have ever heard of it.
Sincerely,
America— Michael Skolnik (@MichaelSkolnik) February 3, 2017
I worried that as a society we’d become numb to violence but our collective forgetting of the Bowling Green massacre means it’s happened
— Brandon McCarthy (@BMcCarthy32) February 3, 2017
“The Bowling Green Massacre? What is it?”
“It’s yet another thing Kellyanne Conway made up, but that’s not important right now.” pic.twitter.com/5dtae1sdl7
— Wil Wheaton (@wilw) February 3, 2017
Bowling Green Masacre #neverremember pic.twitter.com/2D7417fG0m
— Michael Groark (@mjgrza) February 3, 2017
What Conway was probably referring to was an incident in 2011 where two former residents of Iraq, living in Bowling Green were arrested on federal terrorism charges.
Following the arrests, the Obama administration conducted a review in to the vetting procedures applied to citizens of Iraq, which did slow down the process, but according to reports, didn’t actually stop admitting refugees.
There was no massacre and no attack carried out in Bowling Green, Kentucky though.
It’s almost been a week since Trump signed the controversial executive order that prevents passport holders from Iran, Iraq Yemen, Sudan, Somalia and Libya entering the US for 90 days and indefinitely from Syria.
