Donald Trump said Monday that U.S. Army Capt. Humayun Khan would not have been killed in the Iraq War 12 years ago if he had been president at the time – because he would have never gone to war.
Trump has drawn fire from Republicans and others after criticizing Khan's parents Khizr and Ghazala Khan, who spoke against him at the Democrat National Convention last week.
Khizir Khan, who is originally from the United Arab Emirates, pulled out a pocket-sized U.S. Constitution, offering to let Trump read it after he said during his campaign to become the GOP presidential nominee he would consider a temporary ban on Muslim immigration.
Appearing Monday on Fox News Channel's "Hannity," said he was "fine" with Khan's criticism, adding, "I guess it's part of my life.
"I can say this," he said. "If I was president, because his son died 12 years ago, if I were president, his son wouldn't have died because I wouldn't have been in the war if I was president back then. There would have been no war for Iraq, I can tell you that, because I think it's ridiculous, the whole thing."
Trump has said he opposed the Iraq War at the time, though his critics say there is no evidence to back him up. Trump has countered that he wasn't a politician at the time, so no one was writing about it.
Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton was a U.S. senator from New York at the time and voted in favor of invading Iraq to topple President Saddam Hussein.
"I wouldn't have been in the war. We would have had no war with Iraq," Trump told host Sean Hannity. "Iraq would have been right now fighting as they have been forever. They would have right now been fighting. They'd be in the middle of fighting Iran again for another five-year spurt, and they'd be moving nowhere."
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