Senator Ted Cruz Questions DHS Secretary releasing-dangerous-Illegal-immigrants

Senator Ted Cruz Questions DHS Secretary  releasing-dangerous-Illegal-immigrants 

About Secretary Jey Johnson:

jeh johnson United States Secretary of Homeland Security

Jeh Charles Johnson (born September 11, 1957) is an American civil and criminal trial lawyer, and the current United States Secretary of Homeland Security. He was the General Counsel of the Department of Defensefrom 2009 to 2012 during the first Obama Administration. Johnson is a graduate of Morehouse College (B.A.) and Columbia Law School (J.D.), and is the grandson of sociologist and Fisk University president Dr. Charles S. Johnson.

Johnson's first name (pronounced "Jay") is taken from a Liberian chief, who reportedly saved his grandfather’s life while Dr. Johnson was on a League of Nations mission to Liberia in 1930.[2]

Transcript English (Automatic Captions) 0:00 thank you mister chairman missed secretary thank you for joining us today 0:03 thank you for your service like to address two different topics I want to 0:07 start with 0:08 an issue you raised with it which is ices 0:12 and and foreign fighters to the best to DHS is knowledge 0:19 about how many americans have traveled abroad 0:22 to join up with ice senator the way 0:26 I E the way we calculate that 0:30 is there are approximately 0:33 and this is the last time I looked it could be a little higher now 180 0:37 individuals who have left to join the conflict 0:41 in Syria and Iraq or attempted to leave that number 0:45 as I said is probably a little higher by now but that's the number which said 0:49 publicly and I i think that that's a fairly accurate number there's an 0:53 unknown factor clearly sir 0:55 so but on the order of magnitude 180 is is a good approximation 0:59 the last time I did the last time I saw a number it was about that but it's 1:03 probably higher by now 1:05 chairman Grassley and I have joined together 1:08 in introducing legislation the expatriate terrorist act 1:12 that provides that an American citizen who travels abroad and joins ices and 1:16 joins up 1:17 with a foreign terrorist organization has in so doing 1:20 constructively forfeited his or her American citizenship 1:24 there's existing legislation on the book that provides for other grounds for 1:28 forfeiting your citizenship it right now joining a foreign terrorist organization 1:33 is not not one of those 1:35 in your judgment would be beneficial to have additional tools to prevent US 1:40 citizens from using american passports 1:43 to come back to this country and put it potentially wage jihad an attempt to 1:48 murder 1:49 American citizens here at how senator I don't know 1:53 that stripping somebody up there americans citizenship 1:57 is is the most effective tool 2:01 I do believe that we need 2:04 to enhance our efforts 2:08 to interdict those who were attempting to leave the country 2:12 and prosecute them for material support or deny them boarding 2:15 or deny them boarding on the return flight or in some way 2:19 investigate and apprehend them before they can get on the fly to once they 2:22 return and we have spent 2:24 allotted time with our counterterrorism partners overseas 2:28 and within the Department of Homeland Security at 2:31 better efforts to detect those who are engaging in travel to Iraq and Syria 2:36 including broken trap 2:37 so we spent a lot of time in DHS and with law enforcement 2:41 doing exactly that although I guess the 2:44 track record of apprehending people when they're coming back is is not what it 2:49 should be if I recall correctly the 2:51 elders are now brother brother who 2:54 carried out the Boston bombing one 2:57 when he came back to america 3:01 his his return in its travel was not flag other 3:04 supposed to be is that correct very clearly there were some lessons learned 3:08 from 3:08 that case and we've done 3:12 I believe a better job at connecting the dots 3:15 in reaction to that case well 3:19 let's shift to a different topic which is the enforcement of the book the 3:22 border 3:22 up I am very concerned by the lack 3:27 up and force minute the border the lack of enforcement of our immigration laws 3:31 and I'm very concerned on on multiple levels number one 3:34 from a perspective national security and dangerous 3:38 illegal immigrants being allowed to come into this country and number two from 3:43 the perspective of this administration on enforcing the law 3:46 now last week 3:50 the washington times ran an article the headline on which was 3:54 illegal immigrant deportations plummet as Amnesty hampers removal efforts 4:00 and it describes this year deportations have fallen 4:06 by another 25 percent this year and indeed 4:10 overall deportations have those who are here illegally 4:14 are down 41 percent from three years ago 4:19 and indeed the article goes on to say and the drop began almost exactly 4:25 at the beginning President Obama's illegal amnesty 4:29 mister secretary how do you explain a 41 percent 4:35 drop in removals 4:38 a valence here illegally a 4:41 a couple things sir one the apprehensions 4:46 are in fact lower on the southern border so the intake is lower 4:50 this fiscal year in particular to I 4:54 Secure Communities Secure Communities was a controversial program that led to 5:00 the enactment up restrictions prohibitions 5:03 on cooperating with our immigration enforcement personnel 5:07 in a number of different state and local municipalities 5:11 it so forth Secure Communities was coming so controversial 5:15 that mayors governors were passing laws ordinances 5:19 that prevented cooperating with us in our enforcement 5:22 efforts and so we ended the Secure Communities program as I mentioned 5:26 and put in its place a new program that I believe 5:29 will promote enforcement so that we can get at the criminals but Secure 5:34 Communities in my judgment is one of the reasons where we're seeing 5:38 bpm select lower numbers along with a few other things certainly East stated 5:42 you're interested in just a moment ago at 5:45 getting at the criminals sleep well I guess this is very much the same as the 5:48 president's 5:49 reported justification for his illegal amnesty program that it would allow 5:55 the focus a prosecutorial Reese resources on violent criminals 6:00 it strikes me as a fairly serious problem with that argument which is 6:03 namely that the department is not focusing its resources on violent 6:06 criminals 6:07 indeed the number of criminal aliens 6:11 deported from the interior has declined 23 percent since last year 6:15 and declined 39 percent since the peak in 2011 so when it comes to violent 6:20 criminals 6:21 the department is not stepping up its efforts and indeed 6:25 if you look to 2013 in 2013 the Department released 6:32 thirty-six thousand and seven criminal aliens 6:36 with serious convictions that included 116 with convictions for homicide 6:42 43 with convictions for negligent manslaughter 6:45 14 with convictions for voluntary manslaughter one with a conviction 6:50 for something ice classified as quote homicide 6:54 will fall kill public official gun and that individual was released 7:00 in addition to that yet 15,000 635 7:06 criminal aliens who have been convicted of drunk driving 7:10 that were released back into the population 7:13 2,691 who had convictions for assault 7:18 that were released into the population why is that apartment releasing so many 7:24 criminal aliens and and secondly 7:26 can you tell this committee in the six and a half years at the Obama 7:30 administration's tenure 7:31 just how many criminal aliens have been released how many murders how many 7:36 rapists 7:37 how many people who have been convicted a violent assault had been released into 7:41 the population 7:47 yes I as you pointed out senator and fiscal year thirteen 7:52 there were about 36,000 individuals convicted of a crime 7:57 who once in our immigration system were bonded out 8:01 that number declined to about 30,000 and fiscal year fourteen but in my judgment 8:06 that number is still too high 8:08 so in reaction to this situation 8:12 I directed that we do a number of things differently including elevating the 8:16 approval for a circumstance where somebody has been convicted of a crime 8:22 is released from immigration detention it is the case that 8:26 some these cases are due to release is by immigration judges 8:29 or by the Supreme Court jurisprudence and zaba das purses 8:34 Davis but I do think we could do a better job which is why I've directed we 8:39 elevate the approval level for that and 8:42 that we no longer release people for lack of space 8:46 that was an issue an f.y.i 13 especially when we were dealing with 8:50 sequestration we had a situation where released a lot of people because we were 8:55 concerned we didn't have the space and have directed 8:57 that should not be an excuse for releasing somebody we should find the 9:01 space 9:02 and so this is a problem 9:05 I recognize exist and I'm interested in promoting public safety and that's why 9:09 I've directed these changes sir 9:10 thank you mister secretary now follow up with a a written request for the 9:14 information I asked for 9:15 thank you written thank you mister