Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen testified before the House Homeland Security Committee, where she was grilled about the Trump administration’s controversial immigration policies that resulted in children being separated from their parents.
Here’s what we learned from today’s hearing:
Rep. Al Green, a Democrat from Texas, accused the Trump administration of preventing people of color from coming to the US.
He continued: “This is about color. We’ve opened our doors, your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, yearning to breathe free. Except we now have our quota of people of color.”
Rep. Nanette Barragán, a Democrat from California, told Kirstjen Nielsen that she will hold the Homeland Security secretary accountable for what happens at the border.
Barragán said she saw asylum seekers turned away despite Nielsen’s claim that the US didn’t do that.
She also went after Nielsen on family separations, calling her comments on wanting to act with compassion “outrageous.”
Here’s a portion of their exchange:
Barragán: You testified that asylum seekers are not being turned away at the ports of entry. Was that your testimony here today?
Nielsen: They are not turned away — they are brought in — I am not sure if you are talking about the migrant protection protocol. But in that case —
Barragán: Any asylum seeker who comes to a port of entry, you basically have just said —
Nielsen: You are allowed to make your claim.
Barragán: OK. Well, let me tell you madam secretary, either you are lying to this committee, or you don’t know what’s happening at the border. I have been there firsthand, and I have seen it, twice.
DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and Rep. Bennie Thompson, the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, sparred at today’s hearing over whether children are kept in “cages” at border patrol facilities.
The exchange prompted Nielsen to use her hands to show what a cage would look like.
Thompson called on Nielsen to “admit” that Customs and Border Protection uses cages, which he had seen. But Nielsen said that as children are processed, CBP uses “sub-parts” of its facilities to separate them for their safety.
Here’s how the exchange unfolded:
Thompson: For the record, are we still using cages for children?
Nielsen: Sir, we don’t use cages for children. In the border facilities, that you have been to, they were not made to detain children. As the children are processed through, they are in sub-parts of those facilities
Thompson: Madam, madam secretary …
Nielsen: Yes, I’m being as clear as I can, sir. Respectfully I’m trying to answer your question.
Thompson: Just yes or now, are we still putting children in cages?
Nielsen: To my knowledge, CBP never purposefully put a child in cage, if you mean a cage like this? [Uses hands to show a cage]
Thompson: Purposefully or whatever, are we putting children in cages as of today?
Nielsen: Children are processed at the border facility stations that you have been at …
Thompson: And I’ve seen the cages. I just want you to admit that the cages exist.
Nielsen: Sir, they’re not cages
Thompson: What are they?
Nielsen: They are areas of the border facility that are carved out for the safety and protection of those who remain there while they are being processed. If we have two gangs, we separate them into separate areas of that facilities.
Thompson: No, no, madam secretary.
Nielsen: If we have a father and daughter, we separate (them) from another son.
Thompson: … we are not going to go through the semantics. Now I saw the cyclone fences that were made as cages. And you did too. All you have to do is admit it. If it’s a bad policy, then change it, but don’t mislead the committee.
Nielsen: Sir —
Thompson: Do not mislead the committee.
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said the policy, which resulted in thousands of children being separated from their parents, wasn’t intended to be a deterrent, contrary to what leaked internal memos have since shown.
But that memo: In January, Sen. Jeff Merkley released a memo, dated December 2017, that was drafted by senior officials in the Department of Homeland Security. The draft memo, which Merkley said he had received via a government whistleblower, provided a snapshot of the extent the administration was willing to go to deter migrants from trekking to the US-Mexico border, ranging from separating families to possibly denying children asylum hearings.
That draft included plans to separate families months before the “zero-tolerance” immigration policy was announced by then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
Under a section dubbed “short term (next 30 days) options,” the memo says:
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen confirmed on Wednesday that most of the known or suspected terrorists who were stopped trying to enter the US were attempting to fly, rather than by using land borders. However, the secretary would not share specific numbers in an unclassified setting.
Why this matters: This topic arose in January, when as part of a presentation on border security, the Department of Homeland Security said that 3,755 known or suspected terrorists were prevented from traveling to or entering the US.
That number — as presented — was highly misleading. The figure, as the DHS writes, represents individuals blocked from “traveling to or entering the US” — but not necessarily along the Southwest border. It is not uncommon for an individual named on a federal watchlist to be denied access to a flight at a foreign airport or from obtaining a visa when they apply for entry at an embassy abroad.
At a House Homeland Security hearing, Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen was unable to provide numbers on the volume of illegal drugs coming through the southern border.
When Rep. Mark Walker asked about the volume of drugs, here’s how she responded:
Walker followed up and asked her about some numbers that had been reported.
Walker: Our numbers show since FY12, about 15 million pounds seized. Does that sound like it’s in the ballpark?
Nielsen: It does but it sounds like it might not include the Coast Guard, which would be a whole lot —
Walker: OK. 15 million pounds. Would you say that’s a crisis, 15 million pounds?
Nielsen: Yes sir.
DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen says the current cybersecurity threat is “blinking red” and is possibly the “highest threat that we face in the homeland.”
Here’s her exchange with Rep. John Katko:
Katko: With respect to cybersecurity, which I’m the ranking member of that subcommittee right now, there’s a bill that we’re going to be submitting next week that suggests and asks that a cybersecurity infrastructure advisory committee be created, similar to what we did with TSA in the ASAC committee. Are you familiar at all with that bill and are you — do you think that an advisory committee is necessary?
Nielsen: So, we’re happy to work with you on that. We do have a critical infrastructure advisory council already. But we have been looking into whether we need something that can focus more specifically on cyber, because it is a unique expertise, as you well know. So we are happy to continue to have our staff work with you on technical assistance on that.
Katko: And it’s fair to say that cybersecurity is probably one of the biggest threats to our country right now overall, and so the more we can have information flowing, going back and forth between the stakeholders, and Homeland Security, the better it’s going to be.
Nielsen: Yes, sir. I know it’s not the particular topic today but I will just say, as I have said before, the threat to cybersecurity is blinking red. It is absolutely one of, if not the highest, threat that we face in the homeland.
DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen described the journey of immigrants to the US southern border as “perilous” and said young girls on the trip are “absolutely victims of violence and abused.”
She also disclosed that so many young immigrants are sexually abused on the journey that immigration officials now give pregnancy tests to girls as young as 10.
This is similar to how President Trump has described the trip: He has repeatedly claimed that one in three women are assaulted on the journey to the US southern border. Trump’s assertion appears to be somewhat true — though there are reasons to be skeptical of the data it’s based on.
Indeed, the trek to the US-Mexico border has been reported to be violent.
According to data from Doctors Without Borders, 68.3% of migrants and refugees “entering Mexico reported being victims of violence during their transit toward the United States,” and nearly one-third of women said they’d been sexually abused. But this very violence is also why women have chosen to travel in caravans.
This data from Doctors Without Borders, however, is measuring a small group of migrant women and more data is needed to accurately assess the number of women that are assaulted, physically or sexually.
Fact check from CNN’s Holmes Lybrand
DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen was unable to say the number of children who were in Customs and Border Protection custody — but she promised to provide it later.
Here’s how her exchange with Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee went down:
Lee: “Do you know how many young people are detained?”
Nielsen: “I don’t have that in front of me.”
Chairman Bennie Thompson just asked Nielsen about President Trump’s statement that he “didn’t need to” declare a national emergency at the border.
The Homeland Security secretary defended Trump’s declaration, which she’s previously supported, though said she wouldn’t disclose what the two talked about as it is “protected under privilege.”
DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen is pushing Congress for an immigration system that President Donald Trump has repeatedly urged its members to consider — one based on merit.
“We want to strengthen legal immigration and welcome more individuals through a merit-based system that enhances our economic vitality and the vibrancy of our diverse nation,” she said.
The system, which prioritizes high-skilled workers, is used in some parts of the world, though not in the US. Since the 1960s, the US immigration system has largely based entry on family ties.
Immigration restrictionist advocates believe a merit-based system would reduce immigration rates and ensure that they do not need public assistance.
Critics argue, however, that in doing so such a system could harm industries that rely on low-skilled immigrant labor.
There’s another border-related hearing happening this morning on Capitol Hill.
The Senate Judiciary Committee is holding a hearing on the smuggling of people at border with Kevin McAleenan, the commissioner of US Customs and Border Protection. At the start of that hearing, chairman Lindsey Graham, said the crisis on the southern border is real.
Here’s how Graham put it:
House Homeland Security Chairman Bennie Thompson today declared that the days of “lax oversight” of DHS by the Homeland Security Committee are “over.”
Thompson also signaled he would be willing to force the administration to turn over documents the committee has requested from DHS on a host of issues.
In his opening remarks at a hearing on border security with DHS Secretary Nielsen, he characterized what the Trump Administration has said about border security “misleading at best,” declared that there is a “non-existent emergency” at the border, and pointed specifically to the family separations under the Trump Administration.
Thompson also took issue with Nielsen prior testimony, in which she said, “We never had a policy for family separation.”
Citing “internal memoranda,” Thompson said Nielsen “was aware the Administration’s policy would require families to be separated” and “no amount of verbal gymnastics will change that she knew the Trump Administration was implementing policy to separate families at the border.”
“To make matters worse,” Thompson added, “the Administration bungled implementation of its cruel plan, losing track of children and even deporting parents to Central America without their children.”
“Today, the Secretary can choose whether to be complicit in this Administration’s misinformation campaign, or she can correct the record and start a serious discussion about the way forward on border security.”
According to her prepared testimony, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen will call the situation along the US-Mexico border a national security and humanitarian crisis, and double down on her support of President Donald Trump’s national emergency declaration.
“Today we are seeing the results of a failure to act and a broken system,” she says in the testimony posted ahead of her appearance before the House Homeland Security Committee at 10am.
Her remarks draw on Customs and Border Protection data that show an influx of migrants crossing the border and paint a picture of an overwhelmed system.
According to recently released CBP data, more than 76,000 people were apprehended or deemed inadmissible at a port of entry in February. Nielsen will testify that those figures are projected to increase and warn that DHS capacity is “already severely strained.”
She also briefly touches on the so-called Migrant Protection Protocols, a policy that requires some asylum seekers to return to Mexico while they await their immigration court hearing, and describes it as a way to “dissuade those who intend to file false claims.”
Nielsen urges Congress to pass legislation “to fix outdated laws and gaps in our authorities” – for example, doing away with the Flores Agreement, which requires that children be released from detention within 20 days, and reform asylum standards.
While immigration and border security make up the bulk of her testimony, Nielsen will also highlight DHS efforts to respond to natural disasters and drug smuggling, and strengthen cybersecurity.
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen on Wednesday will become the highest Trump administration official yet this year to testify on the administration’s immigration policies.
Nielsen, who assumed the post in December 2017, is appearing before the House Homeland Security Committee for a hearing on border security, which encompasses President Donald Trump’s national emergency declaration, the border wall and the administration’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy, which resulted in thousands of migrant children being separated from their undocumented parents.
It’s expected to be contentious, as Democratic lawmakers could hammer the secretary over the controversial policies and denounce the President’s declaration, which they’ve already voted to terminate in a resolution that’s now being considered by the Senate.
