The Trump administration took a "step in the right direction" with its transfer of hundreds of immigrants to an El Salvador prison, former acting Department of Homeland Security chief Chad Wolf told Newsmax Sunday.
"[They] are doing hard work to make sure that we get bad individuals out of the country," Wolf, appearing with Customs and Border Protection senior adviser Ron Vitiello, said on Newsmax's "Sunday Report."
"And if their home countries like Venezuela won't take them back, well, we're going to move them to other countries and in this case, El Salvador," he added.
U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg Saturday issued an order to halt deportations, but attorneys told him there were two planes with migrants already in the air — one heading to El Salvador and the other to Honduras.
He ordered that the planes be turned around, but they were not.
Wolf responded that "activist judges" were active during President Donald Trump's first administration, and this time around, his administration "is not going to be thwarted by this."
"I'm hopeful that we'll get a positive outcome as that court gets appealed, as that decision gets appealed," Wolf said. "All of these measures are here to protect everyday Americans and American communities and trying to get the worst of the worst out of this country. So folks should be working with the Trump administration instead of against them."
Vitiello, meanwhile, said that Congress needs to take up the president's policy on immigration so it can back up what Trump is doing.
"They've also got to look at the ability for judges to shut down government operations that are designed to protect America," said Vitiello. "There's nothing better than getting Tren de Aragua [gang] members out of our communities, out of our cities and states, and sending them home. And if Venezuela is too embarrassed to take them back and El Salvador is willing to do that on our behalf, then that's a good thing."
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Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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