“Let me just say what I said last night: that plan is a campaign to make America white again."
That was House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi's deranged analysis of President Donald Trump's new DACA proposal. Jake Tapper played the video and asked West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin (D) for his reaction to Pelosi's wild statement on today's State of the Union on CNN.
JAKE TAPPER: Let's turn to immigration if we can sir. The White House framework for a deal on the Dreamer's includes a pathway to citizenship for 1.8 million of them in exchange for major changes to the family immigration system. the diversity lottery, $24 billion for border security and the wall. Republican immigration hardliners such as senators Cotton and Perdue. they support the President's framework but I want you to take a listen to what Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi had to say about the proposal.
(Video clip of Nancy Pelosi)
NANCY PELOSI: While I'm on the subject of Dreamers since last night the President put forth a plan. Let me just say what I said last night: that plan is a campaign to make America white again.
(End video clip)
TAPPER: Make America white again. Where do you come down, sir?
JOE MANCHIN: You know what? We don’t need that type of rhetoric on either side, from Nancy, Paul Ryan , or anybody else. And I come down this: The president has laid out a template. We're going to look at that template and we're going to work with it. I think of what it really comes down to, Jake, how big do you want to go? 2013 we passed a piece of legislation in the Senate. Bipartisan and people said well the wall. Let me tell you one thing. We have the wall. We need to repair the wall. We'll need to build more wall. We need to do whatever we can to secure the border.
We had $42 billion of expenditures to secure America with that piece of legislation in 2013, but, also, there was a pathway to citizenship for 11 million people.
Now, if you want to go big, that's big. If you're going to go medium or you are going to go small, we've got to decide. You can't have big on one end of it, and then also medium or small on the other end. I think that's what we're trying to figure out.
"We don’t need that type of rhetoric on either side, from Nancy, Paul Ryan , or anybody else."
Wow! Jake Tapper just got the quote of the day from his guest. So what was Jake's reaction? He seemed taken aback by Manchin's answer. Was Tapper's showing shock, disappointment..or was it sadness? It sounded like muttering.
TAPPER: But you..you condemned, uh, Nancy Pelosi's rhetoric. I just have one more question for you sir before you have to go...
MANCHIN: I’m condemning all this crazy rhetoric that goes on. Just because someone’s a Republican, it’s not my enemy. And we have to work together.”
"But you..you condemned, uh, Nancy Pelosi's rhetoric," said a shocked Jake Tapper with great sadness in his voice.
Oh, and as Manchin reminded us, it is CRAZY rhetoric, Jake.
UPDATE: Jake Tapper has contacted your humble correspondent and has stated that he was definitely not sad.
