“Who the hell wants to take care of them?,” President Donald Trump told graduates of the FBI National Academy while speaking about the MS-13 transnational criminal gang. During his speech in Quantico, Virginia, the commander-in-chief said it was cheaper to deport the hyper-violent gang members than to jail them.
“To any member of MS-13 listening, I have a message for you: We will find you,” the president said on Friday. “We will arrest you. We will jail you. We will throw you the hell out of the country.”
The president continued, “I mean, somehow, I like it better than jail. Jail we have to take care of them. Who the hell wants to take care of them.” The graduates responded with applause. “You know the jail stuff is wonderful but, we have to pay for it, right?”
President Trump reiterated his call to end chain migration and the visa lottery system. He called for replacing those immigration programs with “a merit-based system of immigration.” “We want a system that puts the needs of American families, taxpayers, and security first.”
“That is why I have also directed the federal government law enforcement to work closely with our state and local police to destroy criminal cartels like the savages of MS-13.”
The president cited the arrest of more than 4,000 gang members this year. The president said that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) arrested 800 MS-13 gang members and associates – an 83 percent increase from the previous year.
Breitbart Texas has reported extensively about drug smuggling and human trafficking and the notorious violence of the soldiers for Mexican cartels on U.S. soil.
In May, Breitbart Texas’ Managing Director and Editor-in-Chief Brandon Darby and Ildefonso Ortiz reported: “Five Facts Every American Must Know About the Brutal MS-13 Gang.”
Most of the MS-13 gang members are foreign nationals from El Salvador or first-generation immigrants from Central America, the article states. The gang members also take their orders from leaders in El Salvador.
In addition, the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) issued a Gang Threat Assesment in August 0f 2015 and classified MS-13 as a Tier 1-level threat. The gang members’ relationships with Mexican cartels and high levels of transnational criminal activity and their presence in the state and their violence were factors. Tier 1 gangs are of particular concern because of their willingness to carry out violence for hire on behalf of Mexican cartels.
There is a direct relationship between the number of MS-13 members encountered by law enforcement and the Central America illegal immigration spikes seen in recent years, the assessment states.
MS-13 members also often pose a greater threat to Border Patrol agents than the Mexican cartels the gang works under.
In June, an FBI official told the House Homeland Security Committee Subcommittee on Counterterrorism and Intelligence that “MS-13 is not the largest street gang in the United States; it is increasingly the most violent and well-organized,” Breitbart Texas reported.
William F. Sweeney, Jr., the assistant director in charge of the FBI in New York told the House Subcommittee on Counterterrorism and Intelligence that the FBI estimates there could be up to 10,000 members of the MS-13 gang living in the U.S.
Moreover, MS-13 members frequently recruit children who are illegal immigrants. The FBI assistant director said that MS-13 members are “typically much younger than those connected to other street gangs.” They take “cues from the gang instead of relying on a productive family structure. Also, those emigrating from El Salvador to the United States are known to be exposed and desensitized to extreme violence at an early age.”
Sweeney told the committee that the gang has “gained notoriety” because of their “brutal nature.” “Their motivation is rooted in a desire to kill for the sake of killing. The attacks on their victims are gruesome, typically up close and personal. They often involve mutilation and dismemberment and are sometimes recorded.”
Breitbart Texas reported that one-third of MS-13 gang members arrested in recent weeks entered the U.S. as Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC). The Office of Refugee Resettlement reports the placement of more than 40,000 UACs around the country during Fiscal Year 2017.
During that period, 8,750 Salvadoran UACs were apprehended after illegally crossing the border. More than 20,000 other UACs from Honduras and Guatemala were also apprehended.
Lana Shadwick is a writer and legal analyst for Breitbart Texas. She has served as a prosecutor and associate judge in Texas. Follow her on GAB @lanashadwick and Twitter @LanaShadwick2.
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