Giuliani slams Obama, gets fact-checked

Updated 12:53 p.m.

By Ben Pershing

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani lashed out at the Obama administration's anti-terrorism strategy Friday, saying in an interview with ABC News that the White House was making a grave mistake by trying the Christmas Day bombing suspect in civilian rather than military court. But Giuliani also attracted some criticism of his own from Democrats and media watchdogs, after saying during his "Good Morning America" appearance, "We had no domestic attacks under Bush. We've had one under Obama."

The Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, which helped catapult Giuliani to national prominence, occurred during the first year of George W. Bush's presidency. That same year, five people were killed when anthrax was mailed to a variety of government and private offices. And that December, Richard Reid was stopped during an attempt to blow up a trans-Atlantic flight with a bomb in his shoe. The liberal watchdog group Media Matters catalogs other examples.

Giuliani's assertion caught the eye of the blogosphere. TalkingPointsMemo headlined its post, "Mr. 9/11 Gets Amnesia." Huffington Post writes that Giuliani "has joined fellow Republicans ... in seeming to forget that the September 11th attacks happened under President Bush." ABC News correspondent Jake Tapper tweeted that Giuliani's comment "is false no matter how you slice it" and "also gets at the truly dishonest revisionism that Bush's presidency somehow began on 9/12/2001."

In addition to suggesting that America was safer under Bush, Giuliani argued that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab should face a military tribunal rather than a civilian court, as the former option would allow government interrogators to get more information out of him. Giuliani also criticized the decision to try alleged Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in federal court in New York.

"It seems to me that we're going to try the most dangerous terrorists in the wrong place," Giuliani said.

Critics have pointed out that the Bush administration frequently tried terrorism suspects in criminal court, and that Giuliani praised the decision to put convicted Sept. 11 accomplice Zacarias Moussaoui on trial in Alexandria in 2002.

Giuliani said that he hoped Obama's speech Thursday on the lessons of the Christmas Day bombing attempt meant that he had "turned the corner" on fighting terrorism, but that he would reserve judgment of the president. "I want to see what he does," Giuliani said.