The acting director of Citizenship and Immigration Services said on Tuesday that the “huddled masses” poem on the Statue of Liberty referred to migrants who were coming from Europe.

Ken Cuccinelli made the statement on CNN Tuesday evening, telling an anchor at the network that the Emma Lazarus poem “was referring back to people coming from Europe where they had class-based societies.”

He added that in the European countries “people were considered wretched if they weren’t in the right class, and it was written one year after the first federal public charge rule was written.”

Cuccinelli was responding to a question by host Erin Burnett about him putting his own spin on the poem earlier Tuesday in a conversation with NPR.

“Give me your tired and your poor who can stand on their own two feet and who will not become a public charge,” Cuccinelli said on NPR’s “Morning Edition” while responding to a question about the Trump administration’s updated requirements for getting a green card.

When Burnett asked him about his statement, he told her that he didn’t intend to rewrite the poem.

“I was answering a question. I wasn’t writing poetry, Erin. Don’t change the facts. You’re twisting this like everybody else on the left has done all day today,” Cuccinelli said.

Cuccinelli on Monday announced a rule change will ​give federal officials ​more leeway to deny green cards to immigrants considered likely to rely on government aid like food stamps, housing assistance or Medicaid.