“Morning Joe” host Joe Scarborough slammed CNN’s Jim Acosta on Thursday morning, saying his actions toward Senior White House adviser Stephen Miller during Wednesday’s White House press briefing were “like something out of Mein Kampf.”
Mein Kampf is a 1925 autobiographical book by Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler, so it was clearly meant as an insult. Miller and Acosta got into a heated battle of words during the briefing, and while Scarborough has ripped Miller in the past, the “Morning Joe” panel felt Acosta was mostly at fault.
“This is why people hate the press,” Washington Examiner columnist Tim Carney said.
“Where things seemed to really melt down was when Jim Acosta talked, and we’re certainly not putting this on Jim Acosta… You can watch the clip and choose sides,” Scarborough said. “But when Jim Acosta used the language, ‘it seems like your policies are trying to engineer racial and ethnic percentages’ or something, it sure sounded like something that you would read out of Mein Kampf or something… at that point it went off the rails.”
Miller went after Acosta from the press briefing podium while discussing President Trump’s plan to revamp legal immigration. Acosta, CNN’s senior White House correspondent, was called on for a question about the new policy that favors English-speaking immigrants.
Acosta said that Trump’s plan “does not sound like it’s keeping with American tradition” on immigration before reading a passage from the Statue of Liberty, noting that it “doesn’t say anything about speaking English.”
Acosta asked, “Can’t people learn to speak English when they get here?”
Miller clearly didn’t appreciate the question. He said that the rhetoric Acosta quoted was added later and wasn’t even on the original Statue of Liberty. The CNN correspondent quickly interrupted, which only infuriated Miller further.
“Jim, I appreciate your speech so, let’s talk about this,” Miller said before mocking the CNN reporter with a series of sarcastic, rhetorical questions.
Miller asked, “The notion that you actually think immigration isn’t a historic law… do you really, at CNN, not know the difference between Green Card policy and illegal immigration? You really don’t know that?”
Acosta criticized the notion that immigrants need to learn English before coming to America, asking if only people from England and Australia will be allowed into the country. Again, Miller wasn’t amused.
“I am shocked at your statement that you think that only people from Great Britain and Australia would know English,” Miller said. “It reveals your cosmopolitan bias to a shocking degree… in your mind, this is an amazing moment. This is an amazing moment that you think only people from Great Britain or Australia would speak English is so insulting to millions of hard working immigrants that do speak English from all over the world.”
Miller then called Acosta’s comment “one of the most outrageous, insulting, ignorant and foolish” things he’s ever said. “Morning Joe” co-Host Mika Brzezinski defended Acosta, but said he did a favor to Trump’s base by getting so personal and emotional.
Check out the video above.