On Wednesday, Andrew Cuomo made a controversial remark that America "was never that great." Two days later, his comments were the subject of numerous tweets from President Donald Trump.

Cuomo made the comment on Wednesday at a bill signing in Lower Manhattan. He mentioned Trump's "Make America Great Again" campaign slogan before making it.

"We are not going to make America great again," Cuomo said. "It was never that great. We have not reached greatness."

Cuomo went on to say that America will reach greatness "when every American is fully engaged," and "when discrimination and stereotyping against women, 51 percent of our population, is gone, and every woman's full potential is realized and unleashed, and every woman is making her full contribution."

"When that happens, this nation is going to be taken even higher, because we have not yet fully liberated the women in this country, and we will, and New York will lead the way, and watch New York rise," he went on to say.

 

 

 

 Trump first tweeted about the comments Wednesday night, saying Cuomo was "having a total meltdown."
 

Cuomo replied on his official Twitter account, telling Trump that the country "will not go back to discrimination, segregation, sexism, isolationism, racism or the KKK."

 

 

 
But Trump re-visited the comments on Friday, doing so in a series of tweets throughout the day.
 
At 7:44 a.m., he questioned how Trump would "survive" making the statement.
 
At 10:10 a.m., he cited "big pushback" on Cuomo's comment, said "I have already MADE America great again," and said Cuomo "'choked' badly."
 
 
Seven minutes later, he said the statement could be "career threatening."
 
 
Then, at 3:25 p.m., he asked whether Cuomo's statement was worse than Hillary Clinton calling his supporters "deplorables" during the 2016 campaign. He then answered it in a follow-up tweet, saying that he thought Cuomo's statement was worse.
 Trump finished the second tweet by saying Cuomo "should easily win his race against a Super Liberal Actress," a reference to his primary opponent, Cynthia Nixon, but also claimed "his political career is over!"
 
Cuomo backtracked on his comments during a conference call on Friday.
 
"The expression I used the other day was inartful," he said. "So I want to be very clear. Of course America is great and of course America has always been great. No one questions that."
 
He later responded directly to the president's tweets on his own Twitter account.
 
 

Cuomo has increasingly been challenging Trump. His comments about America's greatness were a play off of Trump's "Make America Great again" slogan. Cuomo doubled down on his criticism of the president's vision for the country.

"His philosophy is not just repugnant to New York. His philosophy is anti-American," Cuomo said. "His vision of America isn't great at all."

In a statement, the campaign of Cynthia Nixon accused Cuomo of backing down when confronted by Trump. They accused Cuomo of "folding like a cheap suit." Nixon is running for governor in the Democratic primary, which is next month.