Judge Roy Moore said in an interview on Alabama Morning News that Muslims can’t take on oath on the Koran “to uphold the constitution because religious liberty” is not in it.
Moore started off in the interview by discussing his recent criticisms of Representative Ilhan Omar. She had responded to the Alabama GOP resolving to remove her from Congress for her remarks about 9/11 and using anti-semitic language in a tweet.
Sorry, @ALGOPHQ, but this is a representative democracy.
I was elected with 78% of the vote by the people of Minnesota's 5th District, not the Alabama Republican Party.
If you want to clean up politics, maybe don’t nominate an accused child molester as your Senate candidate? https://t.co/r9NvsZKRUw
— Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) August 27, 2019
Roy Moore shot back, and told her to “go back to Somalia from whence she came”:
You always get hate when you stand for the truth. I did not start this, she did. She’s criticising Alabama… I simply responded in kind. When she starts criticising me for things when she’s been excused of numerous sexual things, it’s hypocrisy. I’ve been married since she was 3 years old, so she has no room to criticise me.
He then went onto explain his beliefs as to why Muslims should not be allowed to swear on the Koran when entering public office:
I’ve often criticized Muslims who take an oath on the Koran because you can’t take an oath on the Koran to uphold the constitution because the Koran exactly disputes the constitution… religious liberty is not there in the Koran. Government dictates how you believe and how you worship.
Moore went on to discuss how the historical links that this country has had with God and religious liberty:
Throughout our history, if you wanted to immigrate to the US you had to support the United States. The constitution. The declaration. Every state that entered the union had to take an oath to uphold principles of the Declaration of Independence which includes God. I think a big problem is we don’t see the relevance of God. We all appreciate religious freedom to worship as we want to, and government has no right to interfere with that. But that’s because there is a God and we recognize this God gives religious liberty, NOT government. And when we remove the recognition of that God, we lose our religious liberty, we lose our rights, we lose our freedoms. And that’s what’s happening in our country. We should remember that if we forget the relevance of God, we lose our morality.