Kenneth Cuccinelli II, acting director of United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, said what Emma Lazarus really meant to say was “Give me your tired and your poor who can stand on their own two feet, and who will not become a public charge.” He also said the poem referred to “people coming from Europe.”
Ms. Lazarus (1849-1887) was not only a poet (the words on the Statue of Liberty are a portion of a sonnet called “The New Colossus”), she was also a social reformer who aided penniless Jewish immigrants arriving in the U.S., helping them to stand on their own two feet.
Perhaps before Mr. Cuccinelli expounds on the meaning of a poem, he should learn a little something about it and its author.
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