The White House trashed the Statue of Liberty while trying to defend its new proposal to slash legal immigration to 50 percent of its current level by limiting entrance to the United States to English speakers and highly skilled workers. 

Top adviser Stephen Miller came out to the White House briefing room to explain the proposal, which calls for reductions­ to family-based immigration programs by cutting off avenues for the siblings and adult children of US citizens and legal permanent residents to apply for green cards.  Minor children and spouses would still be able to apply.  It would also require immigrants to speak English, which is patently offensive to many Americans whose parents or grandparents were not native English speakers when they came to the United States for a new life in the land of opportunity. 

But Miller had no interest in convincing anyone about the policy he help craft, and immediately starting arguing with reporters like NBC News' Hallie Jackson and The New York Times' Glenn Thrush, saving his most-unhinged statements for CNN's Jim Acosta - whose father and aunt are immigrants from Cuba, coming over just before the Cuban Missile Crisis.  He quoted from the famous poem "The New Colossus" that expressed the promise of America to the world's downtrodden.

"What the president's proposing here does not sound like it's in keeping with American tradition when it comes to immigration," said Mr. Acosta.  "The Statue of Liberty says, 'Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, yearning to breathe free.'  It doesn't say anything about speaking English or being able to be 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?"

But Miller rejected that and played down the iconic role the Statue of Liberty has played in attracting people to the US.  "The poem you were referring to was added later," Miller said, "It's not actually part of the original Statue of Liberty."

Acosta pushed back, interrupting Miller.  "You're saying that does not represent what the country has always thought of as generations coming into this country," the reporter said, as the two bickered back and forth about requiring English language skills.  "Are we just going to bring in people from Great Britain and Australia?" Acosta asked.

"I have to say, I am shocked at your statement that you think that only people from Great Britain and Australia would know English," Miller replied.  "It reveals your cosmopolitan bias to a shocking degree."

But Acosta would not back down:  "It just sounds like you're trying to engineer the racial and ethnic flow of people into this country."

Miller boiled over:  "That is one of the most outrageous, insulting, ignorant, and foolish things you've ever said," he said while the rest of the room started to laugh at him.  "The notion that you think that this is a racist bill is so wrong and so insulting."  In fairness, no one had used the word "racist" to describe the bill, Miller was the first.

Later, Acosta mocked Miller's tirade.  "It is not often you are accused of a 'cosmopolitan bias' from someone who went to Duke University (note:  it's expensive!) wearing cuff links in the White House," Acosta said on CNN.  "When they are attacking the news media, my experience is they are losing the argument."