Dem hits White House aide’s ‘unAmerican’ Statue of Liberty argument

Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) is firing back at White House policy aide Stephen Miller’s comments on immigration, calling them “unAmerican.” 

“The unAmerican remarks by Stephen Miller on the Statue of Liberty suggests that when he says Make America Great Again, he means the 1800s,” Lieu tweeted late Wednesday.

The unAmerican remarks by Stephen Miller on the Statue of Liberty suggests that when he says Make America Great Again, he means the 1800s. https://t.co/eTnAAJdCBC

— Ted Lieu (@tedlieu) August 3, 2017

{mosads}Miller at a White House briefing earlier Wednesday defended an immigration plan backed by President Trump that would limit legal immigration. The measure would favor a “merit-based” immigration system over the current priority given to those with family ties to the U.S.

At the briefing, Miller clashed with a CNN reporter who asked whether the new measure marks a change from the U.S.’s policy of acceptance. The reporter cited a phrase from a poem on the Statue of Liberty: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”

Miller retorted that the poem was added to the statue years later.

“The Statue of Liberty is a symbol of liberty lighting the world,” he said. “The poem you are referring to, which was added later, is not part of the original Statue of Liberty.”