White House immigration advisor and speechwriter Stephen Miller went full dog whistle on Sunday, saying that President Donald Trump was merely upholding the “principles of Western civilization” when he criticized the US in the past.
Trump has repeatedly claimed that progressive Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), and Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) “hate our country” because they’ve criticized American policies.
Yet, as Fox News host Chris Wallace pointed out to Miller, Trump’s complained about the US plenty of times, particularly during his 2016 campaign.
“I think President Obama has been the most ignorant president in our history,” Trump said in a clip Wallace pulled up. “Nobody respects us, they are laughing at us, we don’t know what we’re doing.”
“Why is what those congresswomen have said any worse than what you just heard Donald Trump say?” the Fox reporter asked Miller.
“Anybody who’s running for office, right, left, or center, always points out with they think America can do better and where America needs to go,” Miller responded. “But there’s a fundamental distinction between people who think that we need to lean into and strengthen America’s core values, whether it be our constitutional values, the rule of law, the principles of Western civilization, or people who think it would basically need to turn America into Venezuela.”
Trump caused a firestorm last week when he tweeted that the four nonwhite congresswomen should “go back” to the “crime infested places from which they came.” Since then, he’s tried to spin the racist tweets as an attack against their “hatred” for the US because they’ve criticized the country and its policies.
On Sunday, Trump tweeted that the four congresswomen aren’t “capable of loving our Country.”
I don’t believe the four Congresswomen are capable of loving our Country. They should apologize to America (and Israel) for the horrible (hateful) things they have said. They are destroying the Democrat Party, but are weak & insecure people who can never destroy our great Nation!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 21, 2019
Watch Miller below:
Stephen Miller claims the difference between Trump's criticism of the US and "the squad"'s is that Trump is uphold "the principles of Western civilization" pic.twitter.com/UnArEyosvT
— TPM Livewire (@TPMLiveWire) July 21, 2019