Americans are understandably apprehensive after the recent attacks by radical Islamist militants in Paris, especially since the Islamic State terrorist group has promised the same slaughter in the United States. Sensing an opportunity, Republican politicians have been almost too eager to exploit those reasonable fears.

As of Tuesday, about half of the governors, all but one of them Republicans, had promised to block Syrian refugees from being resettled in the United States, a position that shames America’s long tradition of offering a haven for the desperate. The governors’ rhetoric plays into the hands of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, by justifying the narrative that Americans hate Muslims, and the country’s wars in the Middle East are a crusade against Islam as a whole.

Worse still are GOP presidential candidates Ted Cruz and Jeb Bush, who have suggested admitting only Christian refugees. Surely, Christians have suffered horrific persecution in the Middle East, but so have Muslims who have been targeted for indiscriminate slaughter for being members of the wrong part of the Muslim religion. The religious bigotry of Cruz and Bush is un-American and un-Christian.

The worry that ISIS will infiltrate terrorists disguised as refugees is understandable. The Islamic State has threatened to do just that, and early reporting suggests that’s how at least one of the attackers got into Paris.

However, governors and other politicians should make sure to do more research before casting away every refugee. Since the terror attacks on September 11, the United States has taken in approximately 784,000 refugees, and only three have been arrested for plotting terrorist attacks. according to the Migration Policy Institute.  Hopefully, the leaders of this country carefully think before closing the doors to people who are in dire need of support.