Retiring ICE official says Biden boss should have acted ‘sooner’ to tackle immigration crackdown
Acting President Biden The head of the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) called out the administration for their delay in taking action on the border problem, and said that he wished the president had taken administrative action earlier as the outbreak of migrants is getting out of control.
Acting ICE Director Patrick “PJ” Lechleitner, who spent more than 20 years with the Department of Homeland Security, joined “FOX & Friends” to discuss his take on Biden’s border delay, the challenges the agency has faced under his leadership and the obstacles he represents. will continue to face under Donald Trump.
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“I run an agency, I deliver. I confirm, but I don’t know why they didn’t do that earlier,” he said. “I know it has been going on for a long time. I would like to [have] you’ve seen it before. I think it helped a lot. It really helped our work, but I wanted to see that in advance.”
Biden announced long-awaited border actions in June 2024 to stop illegal immigrants at the southern border seeking asylum if crossings reach a certain level.
The president’s order temporarily suspended the entry of non-citizens across the southern border if the number of border crossings exceeds 2,500 per day over seven days, officials said.
That worked for 14 days after a seven-day average of fewer than 1,500 encounters at the border. Officials said it would make it easier for immigration officials to quickly remove people who do not have a legal basis to stay in the United States.
Still, illegal immigration reached a record high under the Biden administration, reaching 10.7 million according to US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) data.
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The number of meeting the terrorist list has also reached 3,500% under the leadership of Biden, in contrast to that of Trump.
Lechleitner, who is set to step down on Friday, said that because illegal immigration has reached record levels, it has hampered the agency’s ability to do its “essential work” as resources have been reallocated along the border.
“We’ve been pulled out of our primary mission of helping CBP. We’re going to help every time we do that at the border,” he said.
“We’re also being pulled in to help the Secret Service. We’ve got thousands of agents pulled from HSI to help the Secret Service. We have to because it’s very important to national security, but the Secret Service needs more money. Give them more money. [to] they’ve done their job right, they’ve provided more money at the border so CBP can do their job and lock them down a little bit, but you can’t keep pulling us out of our priority sets, which is internal enforcement on these refugees. working groups.”
“We have close to 8 million people in prisons who are not arrested now and we have to find them,” he continued. “It’s a big challenge and our people know it.”
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Lechleitner, who also emphasized the impartial nature of the law enforcement agency, flagged the “cleansing” of agents, who appeared in the area of ​​law enforcement already on the books.
“The new management hasn’t come in yet, and there’s been vandalism in some of our offices,” Lechleitner said. “They’re spraying… they’re killing ICE and all this nonsense. We’re doing our job. [a] abuse of public servants, first responders, and my heart goes out to the first responders in LA right now”
“It’s crazy that people insult these first responders who take their own lives here, go out and support communities, and … people just ignore that and … tear us down and insult us,” he continued.
Lechleitner urged any citizens who don’t like the current policy to talk to their elected lawmakers.
Adam Shaw of Fox News contributed to this report.
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