President Barack Obama is visiting a United States mosque for the first time in his presidency, meeting on Wednesday with Muslim-Americans at the Islamic Society of Baltimore (ISB).

“This is an opportunity to send a clear signal to the Muslim-American community that the president of the United States is going to firmly defend your right in this country to worship God consistent with your tradition and your heritage,

” White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said.

The White House spokesman says Obama is taking part in a roundtable with Muslim-American leaders to hear their concerns and “what’s on their minds” before speaking to a broader audience at the Baltimore mosque.

“It will be an opportunity to do a couple of things. The first is to affirm the important role that Muslim-Americans play in our society and to affirm our conviction in the principle of religious liberty,” Earnest noted.
Obama has previously visited mosques overseas, VOA said.

Obama’s first visit to a U.S. mosque comes during a presidential campaign in which Republican candidate Donald Trump called for a Muslim database and a temporary ban against any new Muslim immigrants entering the United States following the December 2 terrorist attack in San Bernardino, California.

While many prominent Republicans, including U.S. Sen. John McCain and fellow presidential candidate Jeb Bush, condemned Trump’s call for a Muslim ban, candidate Ben Carson noted last year that someone who belongs to the Islamic faith is unfit to serve as U.S. president.

“I would not advocate that we put a Muslim in charge of this nation,” Carson said in a September 2015 interview on NBC’s Meet the Press.

Obama has not addressed the candidates’ anti-Muslim remarks directly, but has spoken broadly against such rhetoric on several occasions, most recently and most forcefully during his final State of the Union address last month.

He called on Americans to reject any politics that target people because of race or religion.

“When politicians insult Muslims, whether abroad or our fellow citizens, when a mosque is vandalized, or a kid is called names, that doesn’t make us safer. That’s not telling it like it is. It’s just wrong,”

Obama said in his January 13 speech.
Muslims should be able to practice their religion without being subjected to interference from the government or divisive rhetoric on the campaign trail, Earnest said.

“It’s certainly true that we have seen an alarming willingness on the part of some Republicans to try to marginalize law-abiding, patriotic, Muslim-Americans,” he said. “And it is offensive.”