Over the last four years, the Trump administration's anti-immigrant policies have torn families apart, illegally turned away asylum seekers, and more. In September, I traveled to the Irwin County Detention Center in Ocilla, Georgia with my Hispanic Caucus colleagues to investigate claims of medical abuse against detainees at this Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility. Later, some of these women were deported or scheduled to be deported as retaliation for speaking out.
Last month, my colleagues and I wrote to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) demanding these deportations be suspended, these women are given access to federal investigators, and all who reported abuse to be released from ICE custody immediately.
In November, the DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG) released a new report about the Trump administration's asylum program. This report confirmed my long-held fears that DHS was illegally turning away asylum seekers at the U.S.-Mexico border.
When I traveled to the Otay Mesa port of entry in December of 2018, Customs and Border Enforcement (CBP) agents refused to process asylum claims and failed to provide proof of the capacity issues they cited.
Despite this, then-Secretary of DHS, Kirstjen Nielsen lied to the House Judiciary Committee that same month, claiming her agency was doing nothing to alter the asylum-seeking process. This is perjury and shocking, hateful abuse of power, so I called on the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to investigate Secretary Nielsen for lying to Congress.
