Rep. Burchett welcomes idea of Palestinians relocating to US, TN

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WSMV) - Tennessee Rep. Tim Burchett said that he would welcome Palestinians to the U.S. and Tennessee during an interview with CNN on Thursday morning.

The interview came after President Donald Trump laid out a plan to resettle most of Gaza’s population in other countries and allow the U.S. to take the lead in clearing debris and rebuilding it.

In the interview with CNN, Burchett was candid about not only welcoming Palestinians to the U.S. but also about having good relations with those who already reside in the Volunteer state.

“We already have Palestinians in America and some of them are the finest people that I know. They live in Knoxville, Tennessee, and they’re wonderful Americans if they want to assimilate and become Americans, but if they don’t, they wanna bring terrorism and hatred and things like that in this country. I don’t think we should, but we have a pretty good record with Palestinians at least in Tennessee, so I welcome them,” he said.

Burchett also added that the U.S. needs a legitimate “litmus test” for anyone coming into the country.

“There’s a pretty good litmus test that they should follow, and unfortunately, we haven’t been doing that in the past. I mean, we have 14 million people in our country. We don’t know where they are. We have members of the Taliban. We have Chinese communist spies working out of the capitol. We’ve got these people all over the place. We need to provide a legitimate litmus test for those folks,” he said.

Burchett was also adamant about not sending any U.S. military into Gaza.

“I don’t want our military over there. I don’t want boots on the ground that gets our people killed, gets into another conflict which we don’t need to be in and we can’t afford. I think again if American entrepreneurs want to invest over there, I think it’s a great opportunity and I think you could turn that area around for those folks over there and get rid of some of their worthless leadership.”

Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to meet with lawmakers at the White House on Thursday.