President Donald Trump's senior adviser Stephen Miller's heated discussion with a CNN reporter Wednesday contained a little-known historical fact regarding the Statue of Liberty that he used to make his point.
Miller and CNN's Jim Acosta verbally sparred as Miller spoke about the Trump administration's support of a merit-based immigration system. Miller tried to score a point after Acosta quoted a famous inscription.
"The Statue of Liberty says, 'give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses,'" Acosta said. "It doesn't say anything about speaking English or being a computer programmer. Aren't you trying to change what it means to be an immigrant coming into this country if you're telling them, 'you have to speak English?' Can't people learn how to speak English when they get here?"
Miller responded, "I don't want to get off into a whole thing about history here, but the Statue of Liberty is a symbol of liberty and lighting the world. A symbol of American liberty lighting the world.
"The poem that you're referring to was added later. It is not actually part of the original Statue of Liberty."
Acosta then protested and claimed Miller's answer "sounds like some National Park [Service] revisionism."
As The Washington Post points out, Miller's history lesson was true. The poem Acosta quoted, called "The New Colossus," was written in 1883 and was read at an art exhibit to help raise money for the base of the famous statue given to the U.S. by France. It was not read at the statue's official opening.
In 1903, a plaque with the poem's text was installed inside the statue's base.