Top Immigration Official Claims He Didn't See Trump's Racist Tweets But Also Says They Weren't Racist
The president can’t stop himself from lobbing racist attacks on House Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, and Ayanna Pressley. But for Trump’s top immigration official, telling female congresswoman of color to “go back…from [where] they came” is no big deal.
Speaking on CNN’s New Day this morning, Ken Cuccinelli, the acting director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, said he hadn’t seen Trump’s tweets because he’s too busy doing his job (read: defending the president’s racism). However, he insisted Trump’s comments were merely political hand grenades, and not the racist attacks they clearly are.
“I didn’t see the tweet that you’re reading, actually. I can hear what you’re reading, but, I spent the weekend reading litigation and regulatory materials related to asylum, so,” Cuccinelli began, chuckling. “You know, I don’t—I can see the president is commenting on some of the splits in the Democratic caucus, in the House presumably, but beyond that I’m staying focused on trying to fix our asylum system.”
Cuccinelli said some more things about how these Democrats “complain” too much, as if there’s nothing to complain about. CNN’s Alisyn Camerota pressed Cuccinelli further, asking him that as the head of immigration processes, if he thought the president should be telling U.S. citizens of color to go “back” to their country of origin. The two then got into a heated exchange about who has been on Twitter last, LOL!
The most remarkable part of Cuccinelli’s segment is at the end, when Camerota asked him if it was correct that he had gone on anchor Jake Tapper’s program the day before, where Tapper had read Trump’s tweets aloud to him. Here was the exchange:
Camerota: “Director Cuccinelli, did my colleague Jake Tapper read you that tweet yesterday, on air?”
Cuccinelli: “Yes, he did.”
Camerota: “So you have heard this tweet before, and you have had 24 hours to process it?”
Cuccinelli: “So what? So what?”
Camerota: “I’m asking you your opinion about it.”
Cuccinelli: “I told you I haven’t been on Twitter in 24 hours. I’m not in there doing the Twitter war. I’m working on fixing an asylum system and trying to make our immigration system legal and vetting illegals work correctly. That’s what I’ve spent my time—including this weekend—doing. Not tweeting.”
A man who has said racist things about how the National Guard should use riot gear to turn asylum-seekers around at the border and make them “swim for it” suddenly has no comment on a very similar sentiment. Got it.