Britain begins debate on banning Donald Trump

More than 500,000 people have signed an online petition backing a ban on Trump, who owns a golf resort in Scotland, the land of his mother’s birth.

Members of the British Parliament on Monday had some negative things to say about Donald Trump, but are split over whether the Republican presidential candidate should be banned from the United Kingdom. He called for a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on”.

David Cameron also has said he does not support a ban, while condemning Trump’s comments about Muslims as “divisive, stupid and wrong”.

Parliament is required to consider for debate any public petition that receives 100,000 signatures or more.

Labour Party legislator Paul Flynn, who opened the session, said Trump had already received “far too much attention”.

Some spoke passionately in favour of banning Trump however, saying he should not be treated differently from others who have been banned for similar views.

“While I think the man is insane, while I think he has no valid points to make, I will not be the one to silence his voice”, said Conservative MP Tom Tugendhat.

The debate was prompted by Mr Trump’s announcement in December that he wanted to stop Muslims entering the US.

Radical preachers, segregationists and terrorist sympathizers have been barred from Britain in recent years, but should Donald J. Trump, the American billionaire and front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination, be given the same treatment?

“Westminster is creating a risky precedent on this issue and is sending a bad message to the world”, she said.

“I’ve heard of a number of cases where people have been excluded for incitement, for hatred”, said Conservative MP Paul Scully.

Some disagreed with the need to ban Trump – but not because they particularly like the guy.

Sarah Malone, executive vice president of Trump International Golf Links, said: “Mr Trump is investing hundreds of millions of pounds into the Scottish economy and its greatest assets”.

“The home secretary has explicitly excluded 84 people for hate speech”.

It was a Scottish journalist and activist, Suzanne Kelly, who created the anti-Trump petition in November.

Labour’s Bradford West MP Naz Shah said she would invite Mr Trump to her constituency, take him for a curry and show him religious places to challenge his views.

That call came in the wake of an attack in California by a radicalised Muslim couple that left 14 people dead.

Closing debate for the government, UK Immigration Minister James Brokenshire noted: “The best way to defeat nonsense like this is to engage in robust democratic debate”.