He's the Tennessee lawmaker who wants the military to round up Syrian refugees
Casada tells As It Happens host Carol Off that U.S. President Barack Obama has failed to act and there is a need for Tennessee "to step up in order to defend our country and our state from terrorists."
Here is an excerpt from their conversation.
Carol Off: Mr. Casada, you've said that we need to gather Syrian refugees up and "politely" take them back to the immigration centre and say, "They're not coming to Tennessee. They're yours." What is it that you worry that they are going to do? What is the threat that you believe that they pose?
Glen Casada: Well Paris, France comes to my mind immediately. I don't speak with my own authority. I listen to what ISIS said and I listen to what our FBI director said and they are very clear.
CO: You say Paris, France. What does Paris, France have to do with these refugees?
GC: One, if not two, of those terrorists that attacked Paris were embedded in that Syrian population that came to France.
CO: Well there is no evidence of that sir, I'm sorry, there's none.
GC: Oh yes there is. The French government on Sunday announced the one with the passport, even though it was a fake passport, was Syrian.
CO: They found a passport they believe was planted at the site. The French government and the high representative of foreign affairs in the European Union has said very clearly that this is an internal domestic security issue. That no one who has been identified at this point, none of them, are from outside of Europe. They are all identified as European citizens. European citizens with passports who can arrive in your country without any visas. So where is the association between what happened in Paris, France, and the refugees that you see in Tennessee today?
GC: Number one, all nine were Islamic terrorists trained by ISIS. They may have lived in Europe. They may even be citizens of Europe but they were trained ISIS terrorists. What I heard Sunday, now maybe you heard something Monday that I'm not familiar with, but on Sunday that one was confirmed to have come from that mass wave of Syrians.
CO: A passport was determined. It's very unusual for a suicide bomber to take a passport to an event like blowing themselves up, so it's believed to be that something was planted. Probably, according to the Europeans, to provoke the reaction you are having right now.
GC: I mean ISIS is telling us. ISIS is very clear. They've said, "We have implanted 4,000 trained ISIS terrorists, Islamic terrorists, into Europe today and we're going to do the same thing in the United States." I mean that's ISIS telling us this. Why should we doubt ISIS?
It's just our history to allow refugees into our country. So, they're fleeing a war torn country and so how can we say no? But they're doing it to sneak in.- Glen Casada
CO: What do you know about the process by which Syrians and refugees that come to your state are processed? What do you know about that?
GC: They're vetted on health. They're asked orally what their association is, what they do, where they come from. But remember, our own FBI director said, in his own words, "There are ISIS trained terrorists in the United States." That's what he said.
CO: Did he say they came in with refugees?
GC: Yes.
CO: Because they don't need to come as refugees. They have passports and many of them, as we've said, all the people identified so far in the Paris attack, have European passports. They can come freely into your country without any visa.
GC: Well I think it's very smart on their part because if they come in as refugees then who wants to turn away a refugee, someone fleeing a war. Now you've got 10,000 Syrian refugees waiting to come in and who wants to turn away a refugee? It's just our history to allow refugees into our country. So, they're fleeing a war torn country and so how can we say no? But they're doing it to sneak in.
CO: They're doing it to sneak in? Is that what you think? Is that what you believe is going on with these refugees?
GC: That's what ISIS says. I tend to believe ISIS.
CO: You know that Muslims loathe ISIS probably more than you do.
GC: I realize Muslims detest Westerners. That's why they're killing us.
CO: Muslims are Westerners. Many of them live in your country.
GC: I know for a fact. They loathe Europeans. They loathe Jews. They attack them mercilessly. They hate Canadians and Americans.
CO: When you're saying this about Muslims who are you referring to?
CO: Just finally, to make it clear, what do you propose doing with the 42 Syrians who are in Tennessee right now?
GC: Kind of a multiple stage thing. Obviously, number one, those who have been here a while, those that are not part of the plan that ISIS has laid out which is the most recent plan of we're going to embed terrorist trained troops into the Syrian refugee population. I'm not FBI, I'm not police trained so I don't know what that date is but let's pick a random number. Let's say the strategy of ISIS is three months old. So anybody that came to Tennessee previous to those three months, we know they came here as refugees and they're not embedded with ISIS trained terrorists, Islamic terrorists. So anyone before that date, hopefully the FBI would come and at our request, would come back and vet those people individually.
CO: And what role does the National Guard play in this?
GC: If the local police don't have the ability or the resources to take these individuals that have, cannot be proven to be non-terrorist trained soldiers, if the local police cannot, if the feds won't, then the National Guard, number one should take them back to New Orleans, give them back to the feds, and number two, guard the borders of the state to not let anymore in, until they're fully vetted.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
To hear the full interview please click on the Listen audio link above.