Donald Trump was asked Friday morning to reassure the nation's peaceful Muslims that they would be treated fairly if he is elected president, but instead, he called on Muslim-Americans to inform on people in their communities if they have become radicalized.
"Yes, there's a positive message, but we have a problem and the problem is a very severe problem, and they have to help us to solve this problem," Trump told
MSNBC's "Morning Joe" show co-host Mika Brzezinski.
"They are actually helping themselves. We do have a problem with radicalization within that community. They have to report it, they have to let us know about it and if they don't, it's just going to be a continuation."
Trump told her that he has many friends who are Muslims, but there is "a lot going on."
"I've seen various polls where 25 percent of the people would support very, very substantial violence from within," he said. "That's not acceptable."
Brzezinski reiterated that she was asking him what he would or say to make Muslim-Americans feel as welcome in the United States as any American, not about what's going on, but Trump told her that she couldn't ask that without saying "there's something going on and everybody knows it."
Further, Trump said that when he brought up the idea of a temporary ban on Muslims coming into the country, he thought it would be bad for his polls, but he didn't care because "I'm doing what's right. It's a dialogue and has to be discussed."
He continued that there were many people who knew that the attacks in San Bernardino would occur but wouldn't report them.
"There are many, many cells like you have with the two people, the one that came in in the ridiculous visa program," he said. "All they had to do was check, if they checked her Facebook account they would seen she was radicalized and wanted to do great harm to our country. Could you imagine hiring somebody if you ran a good business and not checking a Facebook account?"
Also on the program, Trump argued back about show host Joe Scarborough's assertions Wednesday that he and Ted Cruz had come to an
"inside deal" to treat each other well in Tuesday night's debate.
"In all fairness, I was being cute and having fun and did it with a smile," said Trump. "Of all the people running, I will say, I get along with most of them"
But he and Cruz got along very well before the debate and they did speak, but not about making an agreement to be friendly on stage.