A French Parliament member has urged the United States to return the Statue of Liberty to France.
“We’re going to say to the Americans who have chosen to side with the tyrants, to the Americans who fired researchers demanding scientific freedom: ‘Give us back the Statue of Liberty,’” Raphaël Glucksmann said during an event.
“We gave it to you as a gift, but apparently, you despise it. So, it will be just fine here at home,” he said.
“We’re tired of having a very small one,” he continued. “We want the big one.”
“And we want the poem written underneath it,” Glucksmann stated. “This appeal to all the persecuted, to the freethinkers who promised them an open land, welcome, and that today this land ceases to be what it had been. Well, we will be this dry land for freedom lovers.”
“The second thing we’re going to say to the Americans is: if you want to fire your best researchers, if you want to fire all the people who, through their freedom and their sense of innovation, their taste for doubt and research, have made your country the world’s leading power, then we’re going to welcome them,” he added.
Glucksmann has also criticized right-wing French politicians for their support of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk.
The Statue of Liberty was presented to the United States by France in 1884 before being unveiled in New York City in 1886. A plaque located on the Statue of Liberty’s pedestal reads, in part, “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
