The White House is defending senior adviser Stephen Miller following newly unearthed emails showing efforts to peddle white nationalist propaganda shortly before he joined the Trump campaign.
On Tuesday, the Southern Poverty Law Center-run blog Hatewatch published a series of emails dated 2015 between Miller, who served as an aide to ex-Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) at the time, and former Breitbart writer Katie McHugh that contain links and references to far-right websites focused on immigration and “immigrant crime.”
In a statement obtained by The Hill Saturday, White House deputy press secretary Hogan Gidley defended Miller and argued that the report demonstrates an anti-Semitic attack by the left.
“I work with Stephen. I know Stephen. He loves this country and hates bigotry in all forms – and it deeply concerns me as to why so many on the left consistently attack Jewish members of this Administration,” Gidley said in a statement obtained by The Hill.
Gidley’s statement comes amid calls from Democratic lawmakers such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) calling for Miller to resign.
Soon after the SPLC’s report broke on Tuesday, White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham attacked the SPLC, saying that the organization is “beneath public discussion.”
“We have not seen the report,” she said in a Tuesday statement. “The SPLC, however, is an utterly-discredited, long-debunked far-left smear organization that has recently been forced – to its great humiliation – to issue a major retraction for other wholly fabricated accusations.”
