Rudy Giuliani: No Terrorist Attacks In U.S. In '8 Years Before Obama Came Along'

Former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani on Monday set off anger among New Yorkers when, campaigning in Ohio alongside Donald Trump, he seemed to suggest that in the eight years before President Obama took office there were no radical Islamic terrorist attacks on U.S. soil.

“Under those eight years, before Obama came along, we didn't have any successful radical Islamic terrorist attack inside the United States,” Giuliani said in remarks before Trump took the stage. “They all started when Clinton and Obama got into office."

Giuliani is the last person who needs to be reminded, while he was New York City's mayor, members of Al Qaeda killed nearly 3,000 people on U.S. soil on Sept. 11, 2001, fewer than eight years before Obama "came along."

Giuliani was in the process of commending Mike Pence's work in helping pass the Patriot Act when he made the statement. Some people said Giuliani was just referring to the eight years after the Patriot Act was passed, but that would have included almost a full year of Obama's first term. (The Patriot Act was passed on October 26, 2001.)

It's also a line Giuliani has used before.

In January 2010, after the shooting at Fort Hood military base, Giuliani said, "We had no domestic attacks under Bush. We've had one under Obama."

Whatever the former New York mayor actually meant to say, Giuliani's statement was ambiguous enough to anger plenty of New Yorkers and Americans.

"You might want to get that bump on your head checked, Rudy," the Daily News story began, referring to a mysterious wound that appeared on Giuliani's head earlier this month. He told the News he fell in the shower and hit his head.

Image via U.S. Department of Defense