-9999
Floor Speech
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, there has been a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth in the mainstream media about President Trump's commonsense immigration enforcement agenda. That is one of the reasons he got elected on November 5. It is because the American people were fed up with open borders and with the 70,000 Americans who died of fentanyl poisoning, not to mention all of the criminals who came across the border along with everybody else. But to listen to some of my Democratic colleagues talk, one would think that Kristi Noem is deporting grandmothers. Well, this couldn't be further from the truth. So I want to take just a minute to correct the record to talk about exactly what is happening.
The Trump administration is rightly carrying on one of the most basic functions of the government, and that is to keep our people safe. This isn't rocket science. This isn't partisan warfare. In order to keep the American people safe, we need to keep criminals and gangs off our streets, and that is exactly what the Trump administration is doing.
The Department of Homeland Security recently announced they made more than 32,000 enforcement arrests in just 50 days--32,000. This is nearly as many arrests as Immigration and Customs Enforcement, otherwise known as ICE, made in the entirety of fiscal year 2024 when border crossings and ``got-aways'' were at an alltime high. Obviously, this was not a priority for the Biden administration, and we are all living with the consequences.
Of these arrests that have been made under Secretary Noem, nearly half of them have been convicted criminals and others with final orders of deportation. These are people who were either criminals and did not want to appear in front of law enforcement, who were apprehended, or people who claimed asylum or some other legal benefit and lost their cases and are under final orders of deportation but were allowed to remain in the country under the Biden administration. Of these arrests that have been made under Secretary Noem, as I said, nearly half are convicted criminals. One-third of them have pending criminal charges. Nearly 1,200 of them are criminal gang members, and 39 are known as suspected terrorists.
The Department of Homeland Security isn't carrying out this critical mission alone. This is a whole-of-government approach, as it should be. The Department of Justice is partnering with the Department of Homeland Security on a new interagency initiative to crack down on international organized crime, known as Operation Take Back America. International gangs, like MS-13 and Tren de Aragua, have been wreaking havoc, death, and destruction in communities across America.
MS-13, for those who are not familiar with that particular gang, is reputed to be the most dangerous gang on the planet. It is composed primarily of Salvadoran criminal aliens and has 30,000 members around the world, including 10,000 here in the United States. Their motto is ``kill, rape, control.'' As I said, they are one of the largest and most dangerous street gangs in the United States. Many of their leaders are currently in prison in El Salvador for crimes like murder, kidnapping, and extortion.
However, some on that side of the aisle or in the mainstream media have actually gone so far as to describe MS-13 as Boy Scouts in comparison with the destruction and devastation that has happened at the hands of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang known for human trafficking, kidnapping, and drug trafficking. This particular Venezuelan gang has been particularly aggressive in my home State of Texas, where the Department of Public Safety arrested more than 40 of the gang's suspected members just last week. In New York, Tren de Aragua has been recruiting gang members from New York migrant shelters, increasing cell phone robbery activities, and trafficking stolen phones back to their headquarters in South America.
But the reason this gang became the topic at dinner tables across America was that they were responsible for the murders of both Laken Riley and a fellow Texan, Jocelyn Nungaray. I can't imagine anyone would be anything except relieved that the Trump administration has prioritized the removal of these gang members from our country.
The Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice have shown an ability and a commitment to lock up these dangerous international terrorists at breakneck speed. As part of this initiative, a recently created task force in Virginia--just across the river--arrested 247 individuals in 2 weeks. So this is not just a phenomenon in border States like mine. These people are embedded around the country--literally, in every State.
Among these arrests in Virginia was Henrry Josue Villatoro Santos, one of MS-13's top gang leaders, who was charged, in this instance, with illegal gun possession.
Another MS-13 leader, Joel Vargas-Escobar, was arrested in New York just last week. This particularly dangerous criminal was most recently arrested for his alleged involvement with 11--11--murders, but this was not his first run-in with the law. He was previously arrested and deported back in 2018, but due to the Biden administration's open border policies, he was able to illegally enter the country again.
The Department of Homeland Security recently announced that, in less than a week, ICE has arrested 68 gang members of the Venezuelan gang that I mentioned a moment ago.
With Secretary Noem and Attorney General Bondi at the helm, I think we can all sleep more easily knowing that law enforcement is finally able to do their job, which is to enforce the law--something the Biden administration seemed positively allergic to. As a result, our homeland will be safer and more secure.
The Trump administration is committed to dismantling these international criminal organizations that have created so much havoc and heartache throughout our country. It should be obvious and universal that keeping our citizens safe is not a partisan exercise. It is nothing more than common sense, and it is actually the responsibility of government to enforce the laws that Congress passes. Refusing to arrest and lock up criminals who never should have been in the country in the first place will go down in history as one of the biggest mistakes the Biden administration and Democrats have ever made. The Trump administration is rightly correcting the terrible mistakes of the Biden administration.
The American people deserve to live in a country where they don't have to be fearful for their safety, and that is what they voted for last November 5. Parents should not have to worry about their children never being seen or heard from again simply because they go for a jog like Laken Riley did. Far too many innocent people have lost their lives because of the Biden administration's open border policies and failure to keep criminals and gangs out. It is incomprehensible to me that the President of the United States refused to enforce the laws, and it has resulted in so much pain and misery and heartache among so many people in this country.
The Trump administration's, by contrast, arrests and deportations of criminal migrants here is part of the solution, not part of the problem.
I am confident the American people know nonsense when they hear it, even when it is broadcast over mainstream media, and the fearmongering that we hear on the left about the Trump administration's efforts to keep all Americans safe are nothing more than that.
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
Source