Border Czar Tom Homan told Newsmax on Friday that one simple concept makes the difference between a secure border and one that’s not: the law.
The difference is, President Donald Trump is enforcing federal immigration law while former President Joe Biden ignored it.
Homan joined “Greg Kelly Reports” for a sit-down interview in studio on Friday to discuss how he was able to secure a border that allowed roughly 15 million illegals into the United States in four years under the Biden administration.
“Enforcing the law, which the Biden administration refused to do. We're simply enforcing the law,” Homan told host Greg Kelly. “Plus, President Trump came up with some extraordinary executive orders that were proven effective during the first administration, right? Remain in Mexico or third safe country; ending catch-and-release. You know, following the law.
“Law says if you come to our border without proper documentation, you shall be detained. Not maybe, not release you to an NGO, not put you in a hotel room for $500 bucks a night. So President Trump's enforcing the law and you see the difference,” Homan added. “And during the Biden administration, we were up to sometimes 13, 14,000 a day coming across the border. The other day I walked in the White House: 95 — 95 total apprehensions across 2,000 miles of border. I've been doing this since 1984, I've never seen that. And zero releases, zero people being released.”
Homan said 75% of illegals that have been arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement since Trump’s inauguration are convicted criminals or those with pending criminal charges, “which likely means you’re not a choirboy,” Homan said.
But Homan said another key difference between the Trump and Biden administrations is collateral arrests.
“Most of the time we find the bad guy, they're with others, others that are in the country illegally. May not be a criminal target, but they're in the country illegally, where they're gonna get handcuffed, taken too,” Homan said. “Because we're not telling ICE, ignore the oath you took, ignore immigration law. You're gonna enforce the law as Congress intended."
“Now under the last administration, [Homeland] Secretary [Alejandro] Mayorkas told ICE agents, you can't arrest somebody for simply being here illegally; they gotta be convicted of a serious offense. Ridiculous. Totally opposite of what federal statute says,” he added.
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Mark Swanson ✉
Mark Swanson, a Newsmax writer and editor, has nearly three decades of experience covering news, culture and politics.
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