By The Hill ^

| Max Greenwood

The United States could prioritize the resettlement of Christian
refugees over members of other religious groups, President Trump said on
Friday. “They’ve been horribly treated,” Trump said in an
interview with Christian Broadcasting Network anchor David Brody. “Do
you know if you were a Christian in Syria it was impossible, at least
very tough, to get into the United States?”

“If you were a Muslim
you could come in, but if you were a Christian, it was almost
impossible and the reason that was so unfair, everybody was persecuted
in all fairness, but they were chopping off the heads of everybody but
more so the Christians. And I thought it was very, very unfair. So we
are going to help them.” When asked by Brody if he saw helping persecuted Christians abroad as a “priority,” Trump promptly replied, “yes.”

On
Friday Trump signed an executive order that bans Syrian refugees
indefinitely and suspends the U.S. refugee program for 120 days, after
which time the secretaries of State and Homeland Security and the
Director of National Intelligence will be able to decide which countries
to accept refugees from. The order also says that the
administration should “prioritize refugee claims made by individuals on
the basis of religious-based persecution, provided that the religion of
the individual is a minority religion in the individual’s country of
nationality.” As a presidential candidate, Trump called for a ban
on all Muslims entering the U.S., arguing that terrorists were entering
the country by posing as refugees. He also called for the creation of a
Muslim registry.

His latest comments to prioritize Christian
refugees puts Trump in the same camp as former primary rivals Sen. Ted
Cruz (R-Texas) and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R-Fla.).

Of the
nearly 85,000 refugees admitted to the U.S. in fiscal 2016, 38,901 were
Muslims, while 37,521 were Christians, according to a Pew Research
Center report.

According to that same report, about 99 percent of
Syrian refugees admitted to the U.S. were Muslim, while less than 1
percent were Christian.