Following Tuesday’s presidential debate, Trump marketing campaign adviser Stephen Miller was caught on video screaming at a reporter who requested him to supply knowledge backing up his claims about immigration.
“The crime rate in Venezuela is down, I believe, a little bit over 60% over the last several years,” Miller asserted whereas discussing crime in america.
José María Del Pino, a reporter for Colombia-based information channel NTN24, requested Miller if he was counting on figures launched by the Venezuelan authorities, at present led by dictator Nicolás Maduro. Maduro has turn out to be a world pariah throughout his time in energy and has been criticized for limiting civil liberties and free expression.
Miller declined to immediately reply the query, so Del Pino continued and repeated his question.
“I am trusting the fact that Kamala Harris is letting illegal immigrants into this country who are raping and murdering children,” Miller responded, elevating his voice.
Del Pino continued to ask Miller for the supply of his knowledge, however the Trump insider as a substitute filibustered, yelling on the reporter about crimes purportedly linked to immigrant teams. Ultimately, Miller walked away from the cameras as a substitute of backing up his argument.
Trump has made comparable claims about Venezuela in an try to assault President Joe Biden’s administration over immigration.
“Crime is down in Venezuela by 67% because they’re taking their gangs and their criminals and depositing them very nicely into the United States,” Trump mentioned in an April speech.
Politifact rated the assertion as false, noting that crime within the U.S. has gone down since Biden took workplace and that crime knowledge from Venezuela isn’t dependable. In actual fact, the Venezuelan authorities has not revealed knowledge on murders or robberies in a decade.
Earlier than his function on the Republican marketing campaign, Miller served as a senior adviser to Trump within the White Home. When he was not being ridiculed for showing on tv with spray-on hair, Miller spearheaded a few of Trump’s harshest anti-immigrant insurance policies.
Miller was the architect of Trump’s Muslim journey ban and advocated for the heartbreaking coverage of separating immigrant kids from their households at border crossings. As a part of the Trump crew, Miller additionally pushed for restrictions that lower the quantity of people that might search refuge in america, and he advocated for denying inexperienced playing cards to immigrants who may search public help.
Miller even used his time in Trump’s White Home to decry the well-known Emma Lazarus poem “The New Colossus,” which is posted on the Statue of Liberty.
When a reporter requested Miller how the Trump administration’s strategy to immigration appeared to run opposite to the poem’s plea of “give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses,” Miller mentioned, “The poem you were referring to was added later. It’s not actually part of the originally Statue of Liberty.”
After the Trump administration ended, Miller has led the conservative authorized group America First Authorized, which is at present making an attempt to stop the federal authorities from compensating Black farmers who’ve been traditionally deprived.
Earlier than teaming up with Trump, Miller was an aide to former Alabama Sen. Jeff Classes. Leaked emails launched in 2019 confirmed that whereas working for the senator, Miller promoted racist immigration tales and white supremacist literature, and complained about makes an attempt to take away symbols of the pro-slavery Confederacy from the general public sphere.
