Even Laura Ingraham Won't Substantiate Trump's 9/11 Claim

Laura Ingraham: “There's No Evidence” That American Muslims Cheered During 9/11 Attacks

Written by Media Matters Staff

Published

Not even Laura Ingraham is willing to support Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump's claim that American Muslims cheered in Jersey City, New Jersey during the September 11 attacks. The conservative talk radio host, who has praised Trump for his extreme positions and who has herself made Islamophobic comments, shut down a caller who said people in New York City and at Pennsylvania State University were cheering during the attacks. Trump's claim, which he made on This Week with George Stephanopoulos, has been debunked and widely criticized. PolitiFact wrote that Trump's statement “defies basic logic” and that "[i]f thousands and thousands of people were celebrating the 9/11 attacks on American soil, many people beyond Trump would remember it. And in the 21st century, there would be video or visual evidence." From the November 23 edition of Courtside Entertainment Group's The Laura Ingraham Show:

CALLER: I just wanted to make a comment about when the [World Trade Center] towers came tumbling down. I have a brother-in-law in New York City, and he saw lots of people cheering. And I also know people that were going to Penn State at the time, and students rushed out at one of the satellite campuses and were just cheering wildly. 

LAURA INGRAHAM (HOST): I didn't see that. I was on the air that night of 9/11, because my show was on at night back then, and I don't remember that. But I'm not saying that no one did cheer. But --

PRODUCER: NewJersey.com is reporting that no one was cheering. There's a lot of New Jersey outlets that are saying that no one was cheering. 

INGRAHAM: No one was cheering in New Jersey. There's no public -- there's no evidence of that. Well I just think you have to be careful when you say -- I mean you don't want to just -- you get caught up in the moment. 

PRODUCER: There is evidence that Palestinians were dancing in the streets.

INGRAHAM: Yeah, Palestinians.

PRODUCER: CNN aired that years and years ago. But whether it was in Jersey or not is the question. 

INGRAHAM: Doesn't seem like it was in New Jersey so you can't -- 

PRODUCER: And Chris Christie was very careful to say I don't have a memory of that, I don't remember seeing that. But maybe he saw something else, maybe I didn't see everything. So he kind of left the door open -- that there's a possibility.