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U.S. President Donald Trump suggested that those who leak classified information should be shot, while speaking about a U.S. military raid he canceled at the last minute after details about the operation were leaked.
"In my opinion, the people who leak information should be shot," Trump said during a campaign rally where he spoke this Wednesday in Bullhead City, in the swing state of Arizona, in the west of the country.
The Republican leader called those who leak information "scum of the earth" and asserted that they should be "punished very, very firmly."
"When they leak what time you're going to attack a country and the reason you're attacking is really for defense because you don't want them to have a weapon that can blow millions of people away with a single shot," he added.
Shortly after, the Republican president lashed out at journalists, whom he said "are almost as bad as a leaker, since they leak false information."
"That makes them a leaker," Trump declared in the middle of a legal dispute with the media outlets CNN, MS NOW, and Politico, to whom he barred access to the White House after accusing them of spreading false information.
A federal judge issued a preliminary injunction on Tuesday that blocked the ban imposed by the president until the merits of the case are resolved.
Lawyers for the media outlets consider that the ban violates the First Amendment of the Constitution, which guarantees freedom of speech and the press, and that the prohibition amounts to discrimination based on opinion.
The Trump Administration justifies the ban on security grounds.
[Publicidad]