Sarah Palin tells CNN immigrants should learn to ‘speak American’ [WATCH]

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin joined CNN's "State of the Union" Sunday morning to opine on a wide-range of issues, including climate change, energy conservation, and Down Syndrome abortions.

Among the eye-opening comments Palin made was one defending Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump's belief that everyone in the United States should know English.

"It's a benefit of Jeb Bush to be able to be so fluent in Spanish because we have a large and wonderful Hispanic population that is helping to build America, and that's a great connection he has with them," Palin said, referring to Bush's bilingual ability and his Mexican-American family.

"At the same time," Palin added, "I think we can send a message and say 'you want to be in America a) you'd better be here legally or you're out of here. B) when you're here, let's speak American, let's speak English,' and that's kind of a unifying aspect of a nation."

The verbal spat began when Bush told a group of Miami reporters that "el hombre no es conservador," or "the man is not conservative. Trump - the real estate magnate who suggested building an impenetrable wall along the U.S.-Mexico border - chided Bush for answering campaign questions both in English and Spanish. "We're a nation that speaks English," Trump fired back during a press conference last Tuesday.

Bush has the final word, for now, insinuating Trump's logic would ban any other language from being spoken. "I guess, no more French classes for public schools? German, no we can't have that. You can only speak English," Bush said.

While Palin seemed noncommittal on supporting one candidate over the other, she was open to taking a cabinet position in the White House, specifically one in the Department of Energy.

"If I were head of that, I would get rid of it. And I would let the states start having more control over the lands that are within their boundaries and the people who are affected by the developments within their space," Palin said.

Palin said it would be a short-term position, "but it would be - it would be really great to have someone who knows energy and is pro-responsible development to be in charge."

The conversation with CNN's Jake Tapper began with Palin giving her opinion on Denali, the mountain formerly known as Mt. McKinley, and President Obama's reason for changing its name.

Tapper noted that Obama's reason for visiting Alaska is to highlight climate change. Palin said climate changes are a result of man's footprint and cited growing glaciers as proof.

"I think a lot of the criticism is just the fact that Obama would spend the time, the effort, the political capital even on such a thing when the Middle East is a tinder box; our economy still sucks," Palin said.

"So many things are going wrong right now under his purview and yet he would kind of make it a big, darn deal to come up here and rename a mountain."

Watch Sunday's entire interview below.