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Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, said Sunday that President Donald Trump’s administration should prioritize detaining illegal immigrants who are “aggravated felons,” while defending the government’s efforts to restore “sanity” to that aspect of homeland security.
On “Face the Nation,” CBS anchor Margaret Brennan quoted a report from The Independent stating 47 percent of the 59,000 detained migrants in the U.S. didn’t have a criminal record, and fewer than 30 percent had been convicted of crimes.
“These aren’t the worst of the worst,” she said.
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“I was a federal prosecutor for many years, counterterrorism. You have to prioritize, right?” McCaul said. “I would prioritize the aggravated felons that [Biden DHS Secretary Alejandro] Mayorkas let in, in defiance of federal law. It was ‘shall detain.’ He said, ‘may detain,’ and let them out into the streets. I would prioritize that first.”
“So you would prefer that Homeland Security prioritize them and not run up the numbers the way they are in this [way] that I described?” Brennan asked.
“Well, I think they’re running the numbers up because 15 to 20 million people came in under the Biden administration, and they’re trying to get some sanity involved in the United States,” McCaul said. “And I think deterrence is the key here. And Margaret, it is working. You know, the apprehension rate at the border, and Texas is the biggest one, has gone down to almost zero.”
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The border is just about secure, McFaul said, pointing to the end of “catch and release” with the return of Trump to power.
The Trump administration has pushed back against and lashed out at the media over the notion that most of the illegal immigrants who’ve been arrested this year haven’t been convicted or charged with a crime.
“Under the Trump Administration, 70% of illegal aliens arrested have been convicted or charged with a crime beyond illegally entering our country,” DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said this week in a release about DHS operations capturing illegal immigrants in Los Angeles. “As bad faith politicians attempt to demean and vilify our brave law enforcement, we will only double down and ramp up our enforcement actions against the worst of the worst criminals.”
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