Rupert Murdoch says 'complete refugee pause to fix vetting makes sense' but stops short of backing Trump's call for 'complete shutdown of Muslims entering U.S.'

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Media mogul Rupert Murdoch has spoken out on social media about Donald Trump's calls for a 'complete shutdown of Muslims entering the U.S.', saying a 'complete refugee pause' makes sense.

The 84-year-old made the remarks on Tuesday after asking his followers 'has Trump gone too far?' 

Trump then retweeted Murdoch's comments amid the widespread condemnation he has received for suggesting his plans that all Muslims should be barred from entering the country.

'Has Trump gone too far? Regardless, public is obsessed on radical Muslim dangers, Complete refugee pause to fix vetting makes sense,' Murdoch wrote on Twitter.

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Media mogul Rupert Murdoch (right) has spoken out on social media about Donald Trump's calls for a 'complete shutdown of Muslims entering the U.S.', saying a 'complete refugee pause' makes sense

'Has Trump gone too far? Regardless, public is obsessed on radical Muslim dangers, Complete refugee pause to fix vetting makes sense,' Murdoch tweeted

Trump then retweeted Murdoch's comments (shown above) amid the widespread condemnation he has received for suggesting his plans that all Muslims should be barred from entering the country

Murdoch's implication that the U.S. should pause on allowing refugees into the country while it fixes vetting comes after the House of Representatives passed a security bill last month imposing tough new screening requirements on refugees from Syria and Iraq.

The media mogul appearing to support Trump on Tuesday was 'unusual' as he has previously been critical of Trump, particularly on his immigration views, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

In July, Murdoch tweeted saying Trump was 'wrong' in response to the presidential hopeful's claim that undocumented immigrants from Mexico were mostly criminals.

'Mexican immigrants, as with all immigrants, have much lower crime rates than native born. Eg- El Paso safest city in U.S. Trump wrong,' Murdoch tweeted.

Murdoch then followed up with: 'So FBI says 267000 illegal aliens incarcerated. Who are the other two million presently incarcerated?'

Beleaguered 2016 rivals, the White House, senior Obama administration officials and congressional leaders condemned Trump's proposal after he announced it on Monday

Calling it 'disqualifying,' White House spokesman Josh Earnest (pictured) deemed Trump's plan 'offensive and toxic' on Tuesday and warned it would harm U.S. national security

Trump, unbowed, fired a searing warning on Twitter to fellow Republicans carping about his proposal

Into Tuesday, beleaguered 2016 rivals, the White House, senior Obama administration officials and congressional leaders condemned Trump's proposal after he announced it on Monday.

Trump, unbowed, fired a searing warning on Twitter to fellow Republicans carping about his proposal.

A majority of his supporters, he tweeted, 'would vote for me if I departed the GOP & ran as an independent.'

Trump's plan had been cheered during a South Carolina rally on Monday evening by supporters as vocal ones across the country defended the Muslim ban as necessary for national security. 

Calling it 'disqualifying,' White House spokesman Josh Earnest deemed Trump's plan 'offensive and toxic' on Tuesday and warned it would harm U.S. national security. 

He called on the rest of the Republican candidates to declare they will not support Trump if he wins the GOP nomination.

'If they are so cowed by Mr. Trump and his supporters that they're not willing to stand by the values enshrined in the Constitution, then they have no business serving as president of the United States themselves,' Earnest said.

He added that Trump's campaign has 'had a dustbin of history-like quality to it, from the vacuous sloganeering to the outright lies to even the fake hair.'

Debate about border controls has grown more acrimonious since last week's attacks in San Bernardino, California, which left 14 dead, by a Muslim couple who pledged allegiance to the Islamic State

Mourners gather around a makeshift memorial outside of the Inland Regional Center on Monday

Trumps remarks also ignited a firestorm even around the world, with Britain's prime minister David Cameron seizing on Trump's claim that the country has no-go radicalized zones with his spokesman calling the proposal 'divisive, unhelpful and quite simply wrong.'

The mayor of London, Boris Johnson, quipped: 'The only reason I wouldn't go to some parts of New York is the real risk of meeting Donald Trump.'

And the leader of the opposition Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn, called the demand to end Muslims coming into the United States 'an attack on democratic values and affront to common humanity'. 

Debate about border controls has grown more acrimonious since last week's attacks in San Bernardino, California, which left 14 dead, by a Muslim couple who pledged allegiance to the Islamic State.