On Wednesday’s broadcast of NBC’s “Top Story,” DHS Assistant Secretary for Border and Immigration Policy Blas Nuñez-Neto defended the rapid release of migrants and stated that “we appreciate and really understand the cost that our communities are bearing when it comes to the challenge posed by migration to the border and we view those as the costs of a fundamentally broken system that the U.S. Congress has not updated in decades.”
Host Tom Llamas asked, “Assistant Secretary, do you think it was the right move to sort of rapidly release all of those migrants? Again, process them, take them in, vet them, give them a court date, but we were talking about tens of thousands of migrants who are now out on the streets of America, and, in many cases, putting pressure on local governments who do not have the room to house them.”
Nuñez-Neto responded, “So, I would say a couple of things there: The first is that, as you noted, every individual we process is thoroughly vetted against our national security and public safety systems. And any individual who could pose a threat to the community — individuals with outstanding warrants or individuals who may have a link to terrorism — are detained and are not released. And I would also say that presidents of both parties have, at times, had to release individuals from custody in order to ensure the safety and well-being of the migrants in our custody, but also of the men and women who work for U.S. Customs and Border Protection. And the last point I would make here is that we appreciate and really understand the cost that our communities are bearing when it comes to the challenge posed by migration to the border and we view those as the costs of a fundamentally broken system that the U.S. Congress has not updated in decades.”
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