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Big changes planned for ICE, Mayorkas says, as deportations, arrests drop
Homeland Secretary Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas says he wants to make "significant changes" to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) -- an agency that has seen a rapid reduction in its enforcement scope and has seen arrests and deportations of illegal immigrants plummet since President Biden took office.
Mayorkas told The Washington Post his agency was conducting a review of ICE and its priorities, and that he expects "significant changes" when that review is complete.
"What those changes will be, I am wrestling with right now, quite frankly," Mayorkas said, the newspaper reported.
It was not clear whether Mayorkas will loosen or tighten the already-strict guidance imposed by the Biden administration on the men and women of ICE in February.
After the Biden administration’s attempt to impose a radical 100-day moratorium on deportations was shut down by a judge in response to a Texas lawsuit, the administration issued new guidance dramatically narrowing the illegal immigrants that ICE officers can target for arrest and deportation.
The new rules limit ICE officers to targeting on recent border crossers, national security threats and "aggravated felons." While officials note that technically no one is ruled out of being deported, ICE officers who want to arrest someone outside of those categories need preapproval from a superior. Separately, DHS has also now barred ICE from making arrests at or near courthouses. CLICK HERE FOR MORE ON OUR TOP STORY.
In other developments:
- Kamala Harris has gone 63 days without a news conference since being tapped for border crisis role
- Kamala Harris urged by New Mexico lawmaker to involve Congress in her ‘root causes’ talks
- Rep. Carter introduces bill to bar federal funds to states that provide assistance to illegal immigrants
- Stephen Miller calls out Biden for $87M migrant hotel contract: This ‘looks corrupt’
- Rep. Andy Biggs: Biden's border crisis – Mayorkas unfit to serve. Here's what should happen next
- California customs agents seize $2.5M worth of meth hidden in watermelon shipment: CBP
GOP lawmakers denied access to DEA migrant facility in Texas: 'What do they have to have to hide?'
Members of a Republican congressional delegation say they were denied access Tuesday to a DEA migrant facility in El Paso, Texas during a visit to the U.S. southern border.
Twelve congressional members were prevented from entering the El Paso Intelligence Center after trying to obtain access for weeks, Fox News was told.
Investigative reporter Sara Carter told "Hannity" she spoke with the lawmakers not far from the El Paso facility, where they blamed the Biden administration for limiting their ability to fulfill their "constitutional duty to have oversight over these facilities that are paid for by taxpayer dollars."
"All I can say is, I don’t know what they have to hide," U.S. Rep. Brian Babin, R-Texas, told Carter. "For some reason, we were not allowed in. I can only imagine what is it that they want to hide and not show the very representatives of the American people that have oversight over this facility that fund it and that authorize it. What don’t they want us to see?"
"This is not something we surprised them with," Rep. Mike Garcia, R-Calif., argued. "We’ve been trying to get in there for a couple of weeks and it’s coming from the top. It's Coming from the White House. They don’t want us to see what it is. You can make a conjecture about why they won’t let us in there." CLICK HERE FOR MORE.
In other developments:
- El Paso DEA says there's an influx of drugs coming from Mexico
- 'Tidal wave' of drug trafficking happening at border: Former acting DEA admin
- DEA calls southwest border 'major entry point' for cartels amid push to stop spread of fentanyl
- Border Patrol K-9 team finds 67 lbs of meth at immigration checkpoint
- DHS chief Mayorkas says hundreds of migrant kids still coming in daily
- Massachusetts sheriff slams Mayorkas' 'left-wing' agenda for closure of ICE facility: 'Political hit job'
Lawmakers call for Fauci resignation or firing 'immediately' amid COVID flip-flops
Amid updated federal guidance on face masks and new information about the origins of the coronavirus, experts and the general public alike are questioning the credibility of those calling the shots throughout the pandemic — including the high-profile Dr. Anthony Fauci.
"The agency [CDC] has lost all credibility," said Dr. Marty Makary, Fox News medical contributor and professor of health policy and management at Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health. "They have been consistently delinquent, misrepresenting COVID risk levels. The public sees through the CDC’s flawed guidance on schools, travel and summer camps that use the guise of science. That’s why 52% of Americans no longer trust the CDC."
Dr. Brett Giroir, the former White House Coronavirus Task Force testing czar and former Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) assistant secretary, said the confusion surrounding the CDC’s new guidance is a result of "awful communication and planning around the guidance" as well as a "terrible choice of words."
"The real message is: If you are vaccinated, and not in a special group like the immunosuppressed, it is safe for you and for others around you for you to be without a mask indoors," Giroir said. "But, if you are in areas of significant disease or in a high risk circumstance and you are not vaccinated, it is still safer to wear a mask than not to wear one." CLICK HERE FOR MORE.
In other developments:
- Fauci defends 'modest' collaboration with Wuhan scientists, says NIH didn't fund 'gain of function' research
- Ron Johnson: Fauci, media 'finally being honest' about Wuhan lab leak theory
- House GOP will 'leave no stone unturned' in Wuhan lab investigation: McMorris Rodgers
- Nikki Haley calls for Beijing Olympics boycott, urges Biden diplomats to create COVID probe alliance
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TODAY'S MUST-READS:
- Biden WH seeks to extradite Marine vet in danger of being executed by North Korea, supporters warn
- GOP governors hit Whitmer for controversial Florida flight in new ad
- California's Newsom ordered to pay $1.35M in settlement with LA-area church over coronavirus restrictions
- William Shakespeare, 1st man in world to get approved COVID vaccine, dead at 81
- Marilyn Manson wanted on active arrest warrant in New Hampshire: police
- Southwest flight attendant loses teeth after being assaulted by passenger, union says
THE LATEST FROM FOX BUSINESS:
- US cuts Mexico's aviation safety rating, curbing new flights
- Toll Brothers profit, sales rise on housing demand
- Manchin, Romney, Collins, Portman, crafting backup infrastructure plan
- Employees ask Amazon to sever contracts with Israeli defense forces
- Trucking industry facing driver shortage aiding pandemic supply chain woes
- Bezos' Blue Origin may get NASA dollars via ‘bailout’ amendment
#TheFlashback: CLICK HERE to find out what happened on "This Day in History."
SOME PARTING WORDS
Dr. Marty Makary, a Fox News medical contributor, explained Tuesday night how funding from the National Institutes of Health helped finance research at a lab in Wuhan, China.
"Well, 100% certainty that NIH tax dollars went to the Wuhan Virology Institute through an organization called Ecohealth," Makary told host Shannon Bream during an appearance on "Fox News @ Night." "The Wuhan lab was a subcontractor."
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