we have some serious problems and we're going to lose a lot of very dedicated, very professional border patrol personnel, i.c.e. and cbp officers, if we're not careful. and it does worry me. >> senator johnson, i know we're running long, just real quick, if i can, i've been doing this 35 years. i started at what i often called the lowest person on the totem pole as a united states marine, as a private, and i can tell you, one of the most critical things, in those 35 years, multiple agencies, is trust and confidence in your leadership. if you have trust and confidence in the leaders above you, you will do anything for them, anything for them. of course in accordance with the law. you don't have to agree with them. but as long as you trust them and have confidence in them. the united states border patrol, cbp, i.c.e., they have zero confidence in this secretary. how can i say that? let me give you one example. del rio.

as the secretary stood on the grounds of del rio, he told reporters that our borders are closed. at the very moment, literally 20,000 haitians were under the bridge in del rio that had come to the united states unimpeded, set down, established a camp. they weren't apprehended. they were simply waiting to be apprehended. oh, yeah, it gets even worse. so they were sitting under the bridge and they got hungry so they said, hey, let's go get some food. okay. they left the united states from under the bridge, went back to mexico, hit the food trucks, and then illegally entered back in the united states with their food under the bridge while the secretary was literally saying our borders are secure. at the same time, there was probably, as rodney alluded to, a five-day period that almost

every single border patrol agent was pulled off the line in del rio. 224 miles in the sector of del rio, one of nine on the southwest border that went virtually unpatrolled and unmanned for several days. so when the secretary gets out there and says things like that, that every man and woman in that agency knows is a lie, they have no trust and no confidence. when he acts as judge, jury, and executioner, as a former prosecutor, it's an affront to every prosecutor in this country that he publicly became judge, jury, and executioner, and trashed them, vilified them, found them guilty without any due process. he lost all confidence and trust in the agency across the board. so yeah, morale, i'm being told, is at an all-time historic low among the border patrol agents. >> how many of you that have dealt with mayorkas believe he's lied to the america people? >> say that again, sir.

>> how many of you believe he's lied to the american people? okay. he has to resign. he has to resign. >> the people that know him -- >> okay. he has to resign. you cannot -- i asked him when i interviewed him, i said, are you going to comply with the law. he said, absolutely. are you going to provide me all the information i want for oversight on homeland security? absolutely. he came into the committee we were in three weeks ago and completely lied. he lied to the american people. the guy has to resign. >> and senator johnson, i -- i watched your questioning. you asked him three simple questions. how many have removed, how many been released, how many detained. as the secretary of homeland security, he didn't even get into the details of demographics, how many unaccompanied minors, how many families, how many single adults, right? as the secretary -- look, as the commissioner, i know he has that data, because we helped create those documents.

i mean, the chief here used to bust on me all the time and say, commissioner, stop looking at the data every day, because i was calling him every single day about the data. this secretary has this data. and so he either directly lied to you when he said he didn't have it or he intentionally stuck his head in the sand. both are unconscionable and both, he should be removed. >> by the way, we finally got the answers. a half a million people had been dispersed. nobody knows where, but we'll get into that. any other questions from the media? right over here. we'll keep this flexible. this is good information here, however it needs to get out. as long as you guys have questions, we'll keep asking them. >> tyler olson with fox news. there's been lots of talk about late night flights of migrant children from the border into the interior of the country. we also reported last month that i.c.e. has released numerous adults from field offices around the country deep into the interior.

only for yet more migrants to be transported to those field offices to fill the spaces they were taking up in detention facilities. how does this reflect on how the government's able to handle the rush of people that are coming into the country? whoever wants it. >> you know what would be helpful is what's the process? why are we -- where are they -- why is the border patrol sending people to my state? why are they doing that? why don't they tell me what the living daylights they're doing? there's this due process. you get across the border, they send you somewhere. where do you want to go? there's your ticket to get there. >> first of all, sir, the reason the flights were in the middle of the night, because this administration is hiding what they're doing. as we just got done discussing, this administration has been lying to the american people as soon as the end of january. president biden has lied to the american people about what's

going on. secretary mayorkas constantly lies about what's going on. they know that the american public, the more aware they become of what's happening on the border, the more unpopular their program becomes. so moving children in the middle of the night makes sense to them. and thank god someone finally got it on videotape to prove what myself and mr. morgan has been saying since january. they released 600,000. that's just the border patrol. i.c.e. has released thousands. at the order of political appointees. i worked with i.c.e. for decades. like i say, i was the director. when i was the director, i was the director. and i ran operations. however, now the director has no authority. political appointees are running the law enforcement agencies under dhs. a lady by the name of oliveria, an immigration activist in

miami, she is the lady in the white house who wrote -- an immigration attorney, an immigration activist wrote the policy director for i.c.e..ed on what they can and can't do. the reason i know that, i got a copy of the memo. i went into the programs and she didn't take her name out of the writing she did. the i.c.e., being run by the chief of staff, a political appointee. so this is -- the flights are just another example of this administration not being what they promised us, to be truthful to the american people and be open about what they're doing. >> but i think the question senator scott was alluding to is, let's use the 500,000 number that was provided to us by dhs. where do they all go? how do they all get there? and our states and cities and municipalities, are they being warned? i mean, just walk us through a half million people being --

again, another 400,000 got away. where are they all going? >> i can address that. under the trump administration, when we had a surge, what did we do? we built detention facilities, we detained people, we built family residential centers so we had a place for families to go. this administration has been clear. they want to shut down what they call private prisons and they don't want these people detained. so they agreed to multimillion-dollar contracts with ngos that are all over the country. so rather than turn them over to i.c.e., they'll transfer them to a state -- florida, new york, illinois, all over the country, release them to ngos who will care for them and get them reunited with the parents who paid to get them smuggled into the united states. >> so the ngos know but not necessarily the states and local governments. >> i want to chime in to defend the border patrol for a minute. we're the most visible entity because of the green uniform, the marked vehicles, and people can go to the border and actually see what we're doing.

but the border patrol is not shipping people to any state anywhere in the united states. like any other law enforcement, you have limited options once you identify a criminal activity. you arrest the individual and you either release them with something or you detain them or in the case of the border patrol, you deport them. so those are really the only options. the reason that we get to the point we are today is exactly what tom mentioned. when you shut down all your detention and you dramatically reduce your ability to actually deport people, then the only option left is releasing them. the u.s. border patrol is an interdiction agency, customs and border protection the same. we do not own or have massive detention facilities. we have processing facilities. these terms mean something. a processing facility is just that, computers, short term holding. no beds, no food. there's no intent when you design it to keep people there

long-term. border patrol has been criticized over and over again over the last i don't know how many years for detaining these people for too long. that's because the rest of the system is backed up. and border patrol arrests anyone and processes them, the other piece of that that's very important is that border patrol agent is now not patrolling the border. to process somebody for immigration, title viii, as we call it, the full process is two hours. you can quickly do the math and see why the cartel wants masses numbers of people crossing the border, because that's two hours of man times agent time taken away from the border that creates these big gaps. we process and they either go to i.c.e. to be be detained or removed. >> they're being moved by -- >> so they're not being detained. we went down with 18 of my colleagues, i was on the flight, in my row i had three adults and three children. they all had mail envelopes with white newspaper, i do not speak english, help me. very nice, very polite,

beautiful children. but when we were down there, we were being told that the goal was eight hours of processing time. this is while you're still there, chief scott. so again, is it half a million people going through ngos? >> yeah. sir, i can answer that. so, real quick. so yeah. that's what's happening. so border patrol apprehends -- let's go with the family, right? let's break it up. families and then unaccompanied minors. because the majority of single adults are being removed, right? so you come to the border with a family. no documents. tell border patrol agents you have covid, whatever. none that have is relevant right now, right? so you come, you're going to be processed within a certain number of hours and then the majority families, about 85%, border patrol is going to release into the local communities. and they're turned over to charitable organizations and ngos. the ngos, which are subsidized by the federal government, fema, they're going to give them further medical attention,

further clothing, feed them, and then free tickets, here is the key, to wherever the migrant wants to go. wherever the illegal alien wants to go. >> and we have no idea where they're going? >> correct. >> other than you drop them off at a catholic charity or something like that that is getting fema funding. >> correct. >> and they should be getting funding. but then after that point we lose all control. we have no idea of these people coming other than they have a notice to appear or notice to report. >> correct. that's correct. >> which is a new -- which is a new thing, right? the notice to report. >> correct. >> show up on your own recognizance and turn yourself into a process where nine out of ten of you will be denied. >> that's what you're seeing now, as mark said, the local communities. however, they've become overwhelmed. now you're using i.c.e. air contracts to move them over the country because they're overrun. they can't handle that much. i agree with mark. i've been down the border four times since january. i've been there with commissioner morgan several times. every time we get a flight out

of the rio grande valley, three-quarters of the plane is filled with family units with taxpayer-funded tickets to their final destination. >> if i can just have a thought. >> sure. >> in order for us to get this thing under control, it seems to me if the federal government, this administration, is going to be complicit in all the fallout from all that's going on with this country with regards to the crime, the gangs, and everything else, if they're going to be moving any person in violation of the law that comes across here, that there should be some requirement, through legislation or what have you, every sheriff, because we're all elected by the people, we represent the entire country, anyone who's moved into any county of any sheriff, one or more, that sheriff should be notified before they arrive there and if they go to an ngo and the ngo decides that they're going to move them to another county, that ngo is responsible to report that to the sheriff. we don't have the trail that we need.

and ultimately, i think it's important, if the federal government doesn't know this, they need to know. how much are we spending on these ngos, how many hotels are we renting at the expense of the taxpayer? and where are they and how many people are in them? our job is having our boots on the ground and working with our partners is to make sure we know where people are, what's happening in our communities so we can protect them. but there is a clear attempt to cover this up by the administration so we don't know. and therein lies our problem. >> again, we're trying to describe reality. you're saying what should happen. it's not happening. the reality is right now, we have no idea where a half a million people that were -- i hate to say apprehended, they were processed and dispersed. another 400,000 known gotaways. any estimate on the number of unknown gotaways? >> the gotaways estimate is based on situational awareness and tracking. it's a pretty good educated

estimate of how many. so i think the gotaways number -- >> that's the known gotaways. >> yeah. i would disagree that we have no idea where they're going, because i think there is a paper trail. you have to dig pretty deep through a lot of layers to get to it. but the contractors know how many people that they're dealing with, because they're being paid in part by the federal government to deal with it, these ngos. and when they arrive, the expectation is that these cases are going to be picked up by -- in their local i.c.e. office. so, you know, of the share that actually do show up to the i.c.e. office -- >> do you know what that share is? >> you could request to i.c.e. -- we don't know the -- it used to be like 13%. but we think now, from what i'm hearing from contacts at i.c.e.,

the number is actually much higher now because they have the opportunity to get a work permit, which opens the door to a driver's license, and employment, and benefits. so there is a trail that can be followed to figure out -- >> with a certain percentage of them. >> right. >> so it used to be 13% but now because there's employment benefits, other -- >> right. >> -- refugee or immigrant -- benefits, parolee benefits with afghanistan refugees, people are signing up for the benefits. >> and we can sort of track -- i mean, i've identified using the numbers of where the unaccompanied minors have been placed. but there's about 15 counties in the country that have received about 30% of those migrants. and so i think it's fair to say that the larger population that includes families as well is going to be roughly the same. it's a houston, dallas, long island, the dc suburbs,

miami-dade county, palm beach county, nashville, and places like that. we do pretty -- we have an idea of where they are, we have an idea of how many. but i think dhs should be pressed to provide more details on it, and as you said -- notify local -- >> it's probably not as good tracking as what the administration is contemplating tracking your checking account. >> and they're supposed to be wearing ankle bracelets. i mean, i see them on planes too when i travel. we do have a sense of where they are. >> senator, 50% of the addresses that are given at the boarder are not correct. >> not shocking. any other members of the press with questions? okay. why don't we go back into -- by the way, if you've already pretty well your opening statement, you don't have to do it again, i guess, but if you've got more to say, let's go down the line right now, we'll do it

in order, and then we'll open it up for questions. i think the questions are really the best way to elicit this information, we stay on the same topic at the same time. mr. morgan? >> thanks, sir. i'm often asked to provide my perspective on border security and the undeniable, unmitigated illegal immigration crisis we're currently experiencing on our southern border. but look, i think it's incredibly important. the premise of how we look at and discuss these two critically important topics are misleading, uninformed and forced by a binary choice on the american people. the american people are being intentionally misled that the policies responsible for the worst crisis at our southern border in modern history are somehow separate and distinct issue from our ability to effectively secure our borders from anything or anyone doing us harm. that's just simply a lie. the reality is, when policies

open our borders in a blatant effort to incentivize, encourage and facilitate illegal immigration, our borders also become increasingly open and vulnerable to the vast and complex set of ever changing threats facing our nation from outside its border. these threats are not mutually exclusive from each other. they are in fact interconnected. it's essential we have the understanding how border security is synonymous with the border security as well as the corresponding erosion of the rule of law and impact to our nation's sovereignty. criminal organizations will exploit every gap and loophole made available through weak, ambiguous, and faulty u.s. policy. they are masters at exploitation. strengthening an organization's capacity to facilitate a criminal activity expands their ability to facilitate other criminal schemes such as human trafficking, drug, smuggling with gang members and other criminal aliens in the united states. the images -- excuse me. the images this past couple of

weeks where heavily armed cartel members were seen taunting u.s. law enforcement personnel in broad daylight and sending gunfire into the u.s. in the dead of night shows how emboldened they have become. the common sense reality is by incentivising and facilitating illegal immigration, the biden administration is empowering cartels across a wide spectrum of threats impacting every aspect of our nation's safety, health, and national security. the biden administration dismantled every effective tool and policy we had in place. a network of policies and initiatives which had regained integrity back into our immigration system by closing loopholes, applying consequences and effectively reduced the flow of illegal aliens resulted in unprecedented cooperative agreements with our foreign partners and provided resources to men and women on the front lines to increase their capacity to secure our borders. the biden administration inherited the most secure borders in our nation's history

and they turned it into a national security catastrophe overnight. but my frustration doesn't stem only from the fact that they have reopened the loopholes to be exploited by the criminal organizations making our borders more vulnerable. and less secure. it's their continuing lying to the american people every step of the way. there is virtually nothing coming from this administration that's remotely truthful or transparent. i watch politicians and the mainstream media as well as the current administration provide their version of what's happening on our southern border. it's impossible for the american people to separate fact from fiction. they are making up their own reality, reshaping history, and intentionally driving false narratives, forcing the american people to accept misleading binary choices. the administration's chief architect of the current open border policy, dhs secretary mayorkas, is not only jeopardizing our national security but also further dividing us as a nation. mayorkas continues, as we have said today, that our borders are

closed. it's an unequivocal lie, and he knows it. you don't have to be a border security expert to see this for what it is, a feeble attempt to deflect responsibility, downplay the severity of the crisis and convince the american people everything is under control. it's all a lie. a few minutes ago i talked about what happened in del rio which i think was an extreme quintessential example of what's happening. where 224 miles of the border went unpatrolled as the secretary was saying the borders are secure. del rio is just a microcosm. as the crisis spirals out of control in many areas 40 to 50% of border patrol agents are pulled off the front lines, forced to abandon their national security mission in exchange for becoming professional facilitators of illegal aliens in the united states. an extraordinary amount of cbp resources are required to provide adequate humanitarian care further depleting the

already underfunded and underresourced agency, resulting in large areas of the border unmonitored an unsecured, leaving our borders dangerously vulnerable. it's anticipated this calendar year we'll surpass more than 2 million encounters, the highest on record, three times the size of the state of vermont. let that soak in for a minute. calendar year encounters are going to be three times higher than the state of vermont. during this fiscal year, the dhs secretary has directed the release of approximately 600,000 illegal aliens in the united states. the message is clear. illegally entering our borders as a family, with covid, without documents, and intentionally file a false asylum claim, it's okay, according to the secretary, which should terrify every american. as a direct result of this administration's open border policy, more than 400,000 illegal aliens have escaped apprehension this fiscal year, and there are violent, dangerous people among them.

to say otherwise is naive. and void of the truth. unfortunately in today's environment emotions, politics, and ideology drive the narrative rather than facts. and this is usually where the ideologues will jump out of the chair screaming that i'm a racist and a fearmonger. followed by inserting their heads deep in the sand to avoid the harsh truth and its severity. the reality is there are criminals breaking into our country and it's well beyond numbers, statistically inside consequential. many of them are dangerous predators. this fiscal year alone border patrol has apprehended 53 convicted illegal aliens for homicide. with the open border policies of this administration carried out by their chief architect, secretary mayorkas, our borders are less secure and our country is less safe, and the threats we face make their way into every town, city, and state in this country. and i think the panelists today have made that clear. the secretary of dhs is very quick to vilify, condemn, and

ruin the careers and reputations of men and women he puts into harm's way to navigate the very catastrophe he's created. to publicly act as judge, jury, and executioner without a single element of due process. he's also willing to remove these same agents for failure to be vaccinated while he welcomes illegal aliens, many who have covid, haven't been tested, nor is mandated to get the same vaccine he demands of the agents. it's hypocritical and nonsensical. those who are sincere and with the resolve to address the threats we face outside our borders must continue to demand accountable. accountability. we cannot be swayed by those driven by ideological hubris or the quest for perpetual political power. ronald reagan said it best, better than i ever could. a nation that cannot control its borders is not a nation. >> thank you. >> again, thank you for the time today. i want to be clear, i'm here to discuss border security and its

implications on national security. u.s. border patrol is a federal law enforcement agency that is charged with securing our international borders. u.s. border patrol enforces up immigration law and will continue to do so to secure the borders, but u.s. border patrol is not simply an immigration agency in the traditional use of the term. in its simplest terms u.s. border patrol is charged with ensuring that anyone or anything entering this country does so legally through a designated port of entry which is the equivalent of our nation's front door. as i addressed in my letter to the senate and the house leadership dated september 11th, 2021, i'm extremely concerned by the avoidable and rapid disintegration of what was arguably the most effective border security in the history of our nation. beyond a very visible mass migration crisis, i'm extremely confident that transnational criminal organizations are using this chaos to overwhelm u.s. border patrol and they're smuggling narcotics, criminals,

and terrorists into the u.s. at will. effective border security programs and strategies that have been developed over decades are being eliminated and long term border security investments are being sidelined. common sense border security recommendations from experienced career professionals are being ignored and stymied by the current administration. i fully understand, especially after working for multiple administrations, that different administrations and political parties will prioritize border security and immigration differently. however i'm extremely concerned that the selective information provided publicly by the biden administration is at best misleading. the information they are choosing to withhold completely from the public and potentially congress is alarming. my intent today is to simply provide any transparency that i am able to, to inform congress and the american public of the threats that are crossing our border and heading to your state, your city, and your town, because these threats do not stay at the border.

in my professional opinion, the highly publicized policy shift and the associated public statements initiated by this administration created the current border crisis. of greater concern, the current administration has failed to even acknowledge that a crisis exists or to demonstrate any meaningful effort to secure our borders. contrary to the popular rhetoric right now, it is not an immigration issue, it is a national security threat. the ability of the united states border patrol to simply know who and what is entering our homeland has been significantly degraded since january 20, 2021. low level, unsophisticated, and uneducated smugglers are illegally crossing the border and increasingly evading arrests every day. in layman's terms, that means they're getting away. over several decades, the united states border patrol had developed and refined a border security strategy that was working. key aspects of that effective

strategy included leveraging barriers, commonly referred to now as a wall, agent mobility, technology, and intelligence to enhance the effectiveness of every agent that was out on patrol. for example, the installation of just 12 miles of border wall system in san diego sector increased operational effectiveness from 10% to 90% while reducing the manpower requirement every 24 hours by 150 agents. that is a good return on your investment in my opinion. the united states border patrol had also been improving effectiveness by investing in data analytics systems such as tracking, sign cutting, and modeling system, intelligence reporting system, and a new thing called mission advantage. these systems were poised to allow u.s. border patrol management to prioritize agent deployments based on threat and urgency, further enhancing border security and doing so more efficiently.

again, a better return on investment for the american taxpayer. over the past several years the department of homeland security, department of state, and the department of justice also worked together to build partnerships and initiated immigration programs and fostered international relations that improved western hemisphere security beyond the united states. key programs sought to enhance legislate asylum opportunities in multiple countries while dramatically reducing the asylum fraud here in the u.s. and expedited the removal of fully adjudicated illegal aliens. as a result of those combined initiatives, and they were combined, it was not a silver bullet, the u.s. borders were more secure at the end of calendar year 2020 than at any time in my entire career. my staff and i briefed the transition teams in the newly appointed dhs leadership and we strongly advised them against rescinding these programs. and we told them clearly that doing so would result in a mass migration and it would

significantly degrade border security, which is further come compounded today because of covid-19 and the issues that we had to deal with there. these recommendations and these personnel were completely ignored. as a direct result, the u.s. is now experiencing a highly visible illegal immigration crisis. but i really need to while light, there as agents are distracted by thousands of haitians under the bridge in del rio, there were undetermined -- you asked a question how much. i can't tell you. all we know is there were 400 thousand events people got away. there is other documentation that's even more. while we're distracted on the migrations in del rio, how much fentanyl crossed the boarder? how much cocaine?

i guarantee it did. what's happening in del rio is happening every day along the southwest border. it's not just del rio. there is hundreds of miles of unpatrolled border and there is long-term systemic damage diagnose done that could take years to recover by the current policy. what do i mean by that? the investments in the analytics and other systems processes used to document transnational criminal organizations have been sidelined to facilitate the processing, transport, care and feeding for the over 5,000 to 6,000 newly arriving illegal aliens every single day. instead of spending the tax dollars as an act by congress to build a proven border wall system which makes every agent more effective, which also by the way included a advanced technology and access roads, we're now spending millions of dollars to pause and cancel construction contracts. we are literally paying companies not to build anything. worse yet, the cancellation of these contracts midstream releases the contractor from any long-term liability or warranty

work and shifts that entire liability and that unfunded requirement on to the united states border patrol, which will drain its resources even more. stopping the wall construction midstream also created new gaps in vulnerabilities that reduced the area that a single agent can secure. u.s. border patrol is now perpetually overwhelmed and lacks the situational awareness to have any level of confidence that they know who and what is entering our homeland. the biden administration is fully aware of these threats, yet they have refused to acknowledge them. secretary mayorkas is choosing to ignore the sound advice of leadership despite private admissions that he agrees with them. just like your personal home, if you cannot control who and what enters your home, you have no homeland security. thank you. >> mr. homan?

the present administration is acting in total disregard of our nation's laws, laws enacted and signed by congress and a president. not only is the administration ignoring the laws, but they are actively violating our laws. i'm working with the attorney general with the state of texas, so is mark bergen. we're 3-0 against this president. why, because he's violating law we proved in court and more is to come. i greatly respect each of the cowitnesses here today. they have spent decades in service to the country, and they should be honored. i'm here today with nearly 35 years enforcing all aspects of immigration laws. as a front line border agent to a special agent that conducted large scale very complex alien smuggling, human trafficking, drug trafficking and other cross-border crimes to include large scale immigration fraud and work site enforcement operations. in my latter career, i oversaw the international program responsible for the detention of aliens that were waiting for a

hearing from the immigration judge. in that role saw the removal of one million illegal alienses. all aliens were removed after extensive due process after great taxpayer expense. i entered my career as the first acting director of i.c.e. through the ranks. because of my extensive career i have gained experience in every aspect of immigration enforcement. my opinions on policy and action are based on actual hands-on experience. and what i found works, and just as important, what doesn't work. my almost 35 years of service starting as a border patrol agent with president reagan, and ended with president trump. i enforced immigration laws under six separate presidents, and each had different opinions on immigration, and each had their own policies on how to deal with it. however, until now, no president or secretary of homeland security came into office and intentionally destroyed the most secure border i've ever seen. every president wanted a secure border but had different opinions and policies on how they can get there. however, for any president or secretary of homeland security

to come into office and to systematically and intentionally make our border less safe and more vulnerable to cross-border crimes is unconscionable. within months, the results of their actions has resulted in at least 1.7 million border encounters, 600,000 illegal aliens being released into the united states, and 400,000 got aways. it's also resulted in unprecedented illegal drugs being smuggled into the u.s. that are killing our children. you don't have to be a border expert to understand the simple context that you can't have homeland security or national security without border security. it won't and can't happen. i've read the statements of mark morgan, and chief scott and agree 100%. since i'm the i.c.e. director, i'll spend time on interior enforcement. first, you must understand there can be no border security without interior enforcement, especially at a time when nearly 90% of asylum claims at the boarder are fraudulent claims. the latest data from immigration court shows nearly 90% of central americans that have claimed asylum simply don't get

relief from u.s. courts because they simply don't qualify or they don't show up in court. and what happens to the nine out of ten that are order removed on average, 3 to 6% depart the u.s.'s order and become fugitives. what is the penalty for the hundreds of thousands of family units that enter this country in violation of law? what is the penalty for ignoring the judge's order and failing to leave? they will get amnesty, under the biden plan, they will be rewarded. this ridiculous cycle will do nothing but bring more illegal aliens to our border. the secretary has set out new priorities to dhs to enforce immigration law. i have it here with me. the memo outlines the priorities for interior enforcement. the objective clearly states that being in the country illegally is no longer a sole reason for an immigration officer to make an arrest. that is a ridiculous concept, to deploy in the middle of a border crisis a memo that reads there.

however, it falls right in line with the border's they have implemented. the border crisis we have seen on the border, the secretary sends out a memo which says this, the fact that individuals is a removal noncitizen therefore should not alone be the basis for any enforcement action against them. being in the country illegally is no longer illegal, and i.c.e. agents can't arrest them. the priorities listed are agents that pose a national security threat, pose a significant danger to the community, and recent border entrants. let's be clear. recent border entrants are not a priority in practice, no matter what the memo says. one easy measure is to have i.c.e. produce the number of recent border crossers they have arrested in the interior. that number is close to zero. which of course means removal of recent border crossers arrested by i.c.e. is close to zero. the fact so far this fiscal year, they have over 600,000 illegal aliens reaching the u.s.

u.s. mainly without court date, which shows the operational reality. they are not priorities if they don't have a court date. add to that another 400,000 got aways that i.c.e. is not looking for. if these aliens show up in court and lose their case, based on recent data, 90%, again, will not be ordered. deported. it's most likely that no enforcement action will be taken because under the same memorandum, guidance that went out, being in the country illegally is not a priority of removal. and one must consider equity, such as usc children, relatives, criminal records, community involvement, members of church, et cetera. by the time their case ends in three to five years, many will have u.s. citizen children, and will be established in the community in some fashion. once again, they are immune from immigration law enforcement. this isn't a mistake in policy. this is by design. this administration knows exactly what they're doing because when they stare at three to five years, they will have a u.s. citizen child or two. when i was i.c.e. director, why

did you remove that father with two usc children? because he was ordered removed, and he went and hid out for five years and had two usc kids, so now all of the sudden he's immune? does the court order mean anything? i say based on the secretary's memorandum, let's shut down immigration courts because he said it, a final order removal does not mean anything anymore. i.c.e. officers, there are 700,000 fugitives in this country, people who had due process at great taxpayer expense were ordered removed by a federal judge, and i.c.e. can't arrest them. so those orders will not be executed. so might as well shut down immigration courts too. as far as public safety threats, one must understand, when the administration came into power, the i.c.e. data was clear. 91% last year of everybody i.c.e. arrested in the interior of the united states were a convicted criminal or pending criminal charges, which means they found them in the county jail. that's nine out of ten. this administration didn't think that was good enough. almost 85% of those that were arrested last year, 85% of the

91% cannot be arrested this year because their crimes aren't significant enough. most of them are off the table. because now you must be convicted of the most serious crimes. if you're an ms 13 member, got arrested in new york for raping a child, and you're able to post bond, even though you're in the country illegally, even though you're a gang member, even though you're arrested for raping a child, even though you had a final order issue you ignored years ago, i.c.e. will not touch him under the policy. at a time we are seeing unprecedented illegal immigration on the our borders, i.c.e. is seeing the fewest arrests in our removal of the history of the agency. the memo justifies these priorities because they call it limited resources. the bureaucratic language that we have to do this for limited resources is a lie. and fy 12 i.c.e. arrested and removed 409,000 illegal aliens. i was there. 409,000 arrested and removed.

today, with more officers, more judges, we'll be short of 100,000. they're doing 25% of the work they did in 2012 with more officers, and there's limited resources. i've talked to hundreds of deportation officers across this country. they have nothing to do. what used to be a daily, aliens with fugitive warrants or criminal arrest warrants, now one officer averages one arrest every six weeks. when one officer used to sit in the l.a. county jail and process 20 a day in one shift, now we got zero. every week i wait for the administration to issue some sort of enforcement guidance, some form of consequence or deterrence to violating our immigration laws, but they do nothing. they make it easy to violate our laws in hopes it will serve the political future and give them perpetual power, because

they believe by importing future democratic voters, they will remain in power. in addition to ending all the successful policies that worked, they have canceled wall contracts, severely limited i.c.e. detention. i.c.e. had 55,000 people in custody. what do they have now? 20,000. because most of them have been released to ngos with multimillion-dollar contracts who are friends of the biden administration. they ended work site enforcement policies, the number one reason people come to the united states is to get a job. in the middle of the biggest crisis we have ever seen, he what did the secretary do the other day? he told i.c.e. they can no longer conduct work site enforcement operations. they're not trying to stop this. there's no enforcement, no strategy. this is like throwing another enticement to bring more. at the same time you have the democratic leadership talking about amnesty and reconciliation, instead of taking some action to save lives, and to shut down these criminal cartels, making millions of dollars a day, and the 92,000 children die in opioid overdoses, they keep

throwing out more and more. it is disgusting, they even recently have rewritten asylum guidance. they didn't like 95% didn't qualify, they rewrote, more people qualify. qualify, so they rewrote the rules so more people qualify. bringing more people. it's unconscionable. this administration has sold out the safety and security of this country, our right to be a sovereign nation, the right to have a secure border for their political ideology beliefs. thank you. >> thank you, mr. homan. sheriff nicholls? >> i appreciate the promotion,

it would be an honor to be a sheriff. senator, thank you for the opportunity today to discuss the situation on the border in the yuma area. yuma is located on the colorado river, in case -- and it's along the southern border of mexico, and adjacent to california. located in yuma, covering 126 miles of border, 119 miles at the border has completed the fencing system, leaving 7 miles of fence and 55 border gates unfinished. in my eight years in office, yuma has experienced three major illegal immigration events of larger than normal number of crossings, 2014, 2019, and now '20 and '21. each time the situation gets worse. the 2014 event had the lowest numbers of apprehensions. in 2019, the yuma sector apprehended 68,000 individuals, the vast majority originating from central america. it lasted three to four months. so far this year in the yuma sector, there have been over 114,000 apprehensions from 80 different countries. the volume this year is the

second largest volume since the yuma sector has kept those types of records. the largest number being in 2005 that crested at 140,000 apprehensions. i first want to again note that our local border patrol agents, customs officials, and i.c.e. agents are doing an amazing job against these numbers given the limited resources and personnel committed to this effort. knowing some of them personally, i know their commitment to national security is paramount. the yuma area remains a safe community with no border violence crimes, thanks in no small part to their unrelenting efforts. from a municipal perspective, these events manifest impacts into our community in various ways. during large migration events, the regular system of providing transfer to enforcement and removal operations portion of i.c.e. breaks down, which is the full intent of the transnational criminal organization.

if the releases do not go through a regular process, individuals will be released within the local community. in 2019, 5,200 people were released into a temporary shelter system in yuma. in a community of 100,000 people. at the beginning of the 2021 event, we had a couple hundred people released to the streets of different cities within yuma county just within the first two weeks. then a local ngo stepped up and has been receiving those that are released and helped transport to regional airports in about a 200-mile radius from yuma. endeavors is a nonprofit that has a contract with i.c.e., and has a hotel located in yuma dedicated to holding families that are to be released to transportation options. there was a question of cost. that cost is $365 per day, per

person to hold migrants at the hotel. and since every room has a family, there's at least two people per room. quickly that's $700 a day for food and housing. these systems, including our current local ngo, as well as the endeavor system, are not sustainable. should they break down or contracts end, the releases would again begin in the yuma community. yuma county medical infrastructure is impacted by the use of migrants requiring medical care. the cost of these services are only reimbursed about one-third of the cost by the u.s. government. the other two-thirds are reimbursed by the taxpayers in yuma. our agricultural fields that are adjacent to the border are impacted directly as migrants walk through the middle of the fields, making the fields, according to food safety rules, unusable for human consumption. not only is that a loss to the

farmer who's taking the risk of planting the fields, but to the workers who are paid on a per-piece basis as they have less crops to harvest. some impacts to small communities are difficult to quantify. hotels that are taken out of community resources for facilities like endeavors, jobs and local revenues supported from tourists visiting the area, eating at restaurants, and purchasing goods in the local stores are lost. the publicity on the news of social media paint a picture of chaos and unsafe situations, discouraging investment and economic engagement in border communities. diversion of resources from nonprofits, while might be eventually reimbursed by fema, still take away from the local needs of our communities. lack of planning at a holistic federal level causes fear in the local communities. situations like the cancellation of the remain in mexico policy,

mpp, or the mpp without a plan to address the dramatic increases in crossings that were experienced as a result are drivers of that fear. these situations bring valid concerns about the planning for feature del rio type events and the eventual end of the pandemic and the rescission of title xlii. these are real impacts. this is a federal issue. not a local issue. the brunt of the cost of illegal immigration needs to be carried by all the communities across the nation, not just small local border communities. we need to stop overburdening local border cities. thank you. >> mayor, i just have to quick ask, though, why so much per day? who's setting that fee? is that -- >> i've not actually done that research, but i understand it was a direct contract with dhs. and that was the rate, and i don't know if it was three proposals or how that procurement occurred.

i understand that that contract time period is coming to a close later this year. and so there will be a new procurement process but the contract itself had a total value of about $86 million. >> yeah, i can answer that question for you, senator, because i brought it to the attention of the news. it was a sole source contact to endeavor, who never detained $86 million sole source contract, and shortly after that, a contract from hhs. $365 per night, and an i.c.e. bed at $100, we give medical, dental, three squares, everything, but again, shutting down i.c.e. detention, awarding companies like endeavor. >> again, that's per person. you can go -- that's a lucrative contract, rent a room for a hundred bucks, give them some boxed lunches, you make a lot of money per person per day. got to love government.

>> guys, i have a scheduled appointment i couldn't change. so i'm going to run and do that and come back, and hopefully get the chance to hear from you again, but i just want to make a couple of comments, if i could, one, mayor nicholls, you talked about title xlii. one thing that hasn't come up today, and having been along the border, it's at front of mind of the board agents, at some point title xlii is going to go away. this covid pandemic has lasted longer than anybody hoped. one of the changes they made when the biden administration came in, we're no longer going to apply it to the kids. now even some individuals. but the point is, most individuals are being turned back. and i don't think the american people know that because of title xlii. that's not going to be there. so we look at these numbers, we look at what we heard today, the largest number of apprehensions in 35 years, it's not going to get better.

and by the way, usually gets better in the summer, it's too hot. it's gotten worse in the summer, so i just want to make that point. and second, mayor, you talked earlier about the h2a program, and this is a program that has workers come in legally under properly legal channels to be agricultural workers. a lot of landscapers, as do greenhouses use it, and so on. the united states of america is the most generous country in the world in terms of legal immigration. and we haven't talked about that today but the context of all of this should be we are a very generous country. every one of us here are the children or grandchildren, great grandchildren of immigrants. and we're proud of that. and they have enriched our country. so it's not that we're saying, here, we don't want immigrants. what we're saying, is let's do it in a legal, proper, humane, safe way. we talked about the traffickers earlier, they don't give a darn

about these people. and the sexual assaults that are occurring along the border, you talked about what the hospitals are having to put up with. i know some of that is sexual assaults. now, because it's just inhumane what's happening, so i just wanted to make those points, and finally, there is an issue about other countries that has come up today, and you talked about how mexico ought to be asked to do more. or that we have the sovereign ability. i have a little different perspective on this. i think mexico's been pretty darn helpful, and when i toured recently mexico, and guatemala, and ecuador, and colombia, this was a couple of months ago, i talked to all four presidents of those countries, and when asked, and some voluntarily, they all said the same thing, they don't want their people coming illegally to our country. they actually don't. they're losing some of their young people, they would rather have them stay at home. they believe our system has pull factors, we talk about push factors all the time.

sure, there are push factors, and by the way, more than half of the immigrants are now not calling from the so-called northern triangle countries where we want to put another $4 billion after $3.6 in the last five years, i'm not against that but that's not going to solve the problem. what's going to solve the problem is, yes, economic development, but the pull factors have to be addressed, and i think that's what you're having to say in effect today, is that we have so many pull factors now, and specifically to my way of thinking, and senator johnson knows this. i think the asylum system is totally broken and is creating a narrative for these traffickers. these people who are exploiting the families, not just of central america, but half are coming from other countries by saying, hey, get you to the border, you're in. pay me 10,000 bucks. and you know what, they're right. so until we deal with the policy changes and, again, we've gone over some of these today, title 42 was one. the initial policy changes, it's going to change again. we're not going to be able to

control this issue. and so again, i thank you all for giving this information today. i wanted to bring it up a little bit, and talk. this is not us saying we don't want immigrants in this country. it's saying we want them to come the proper way, and that would continue to enrich our country, and i'll be back, thank you. >> sheriff hodgson. >> thank you, senator. >> as a sheriff for almost 25 years, i'm a person elected to represent the public safety interests of almost 600,000 people in southeastern massachusetts. and for more than two decades i have worked with leaders of local, state, and federal levels on immigration laws, reforms back to the days of hyde and frank's bipartisan bill. this drive to protect my communities from the harms of illegal immigration has taken me from the southwest border to the massachusetts state house, local town hall meetings, congressional committees, and the oval office.

illegal immigration impacts cities and towns and communities in every corner of every state on many levels from public safety to health care, education, and municipal finances. crystal county is no different and the impact, particularly on public safety, is immense. assault and battery on a child, identity theft, aggravated assault and battery, carrying dangerous weapons, oui, drug possession, larceny, rape. that's a sampling of the charges pressed against illegal immigrants who were arrested in bristol county and brought to my corrections facility over the summer. from may to august of this year, almost one illegal immigrant every week was being arrested and brought to the house of corrections. and it gets worse. in a purely political hack job by the biden administration, the department of homeland security,

by a phone call terminated my long-standing partnership with the immigrations customs and enforcement in may, and i'm the only sheriff's office -- the facility averaged about 220 detainees that we were holding on average every day without any state money. 600,000. no, on average in our facility. in the i.c.e. detention facility that we built. [ inaudible ] >> approximately, it fluctuates some. [ inaudible ] >> some of them were brought in from new hampshire or rhode island. but it provided the detention that was needed, right. force multiplier and so forth. and among the initiatives lost was the 287-g program, which allowed specially trained officers to hold immigrants in i.c.e. once they had been arrested for committing a crime. without the key program, two of

those arrested illegal aliens were bailed out before i.c.e. could apprehend them. those aliens are out on the streets, who knows where, doing who knows what with i.c.e. actively looking for them. those criminal illegal aliens would be behind bars, and my community would be safer if bristol county still had a partnership with i.c.e. there's no debating that. there's also no debating the simple fact that every crime committed by an illegal alien is a crime that never would have happened if that alien was not in the country to begin with. single mom sabrina desilva would still be alive today if she wasn't gunned down by a twice deported illegal alien in bristol county a few years ago, and as a result has left a 2-year-old angel child. christopher mills would still be alive today if he wasn't run down on his motorcycle by an illegal alien driving a box truck a few years ago. matthew denise would be alive if a drunk illegal alien didn't run him over in his truck and drag

him to his death in milford, massachusetts, a community that experienced three deaths by illegal aliens in two years. the list goes on and on, and i don't even have to mention all the people who died of deadly opioid overdoses. in 2020, 232 people suffered fatal overdoses in bristol county. with almost 2,000 dying over the last decade. these drugs are pouring in over the border and more and more in our neighborhoods, drugs are destroying families left and right. 10% of mothers whose babies were born in bristol county used opioids or benzos in 2020. 3% of babies in the county were born addicted. where are drugs coming from, the border, the d.e.a. states, the cartels or transnational criminal organizations maintain the greatest drug trafficking influence in the united states.

it's time to end the unraveling of our public safety by an administration that has encouraged and aided and abetted thousands upon thousands of people to violate our federal laws, causing the citizens they promised to protect to be exposed to criminal victimization so they can continue to advance their selfish political pro-illegal agenda. and in closing, i would just refer back to something that senator portman said when he was speaking to the angel moms, and he said, i want to thank you for what you're doing. for going out and speaking publicly about the very difficult tragedies that you had to endure. the difference between senator

portman recognizing that and the acknowledgment of this with the biden administration is that the message from the biden administration is, you know what, the loss of your children didn't matter then, and the loss of the children going forward tomorrow and the next day and the next day that we all know are going to happen, whether it's drug overdoses or, god forbid, the kind of violent deaths that these children have seen by these angel moms and dads, will continue. it's time. thank you, senators. >> thank you, sheriff. ms. vaughan? >> thank you. i just want to add some more detail to the -- some of the points that i mentioned earlier in my brief statement on the costs to states and local communities that can be identified and as florida did, you can see they are staggering.

and it's possible to identify them. and i think every state should be doing this kind of an exercise. in fact, the federal government should be doing that kind of exercise. but there's some things that i can report to you this afternoon. aside from the fiscal costs, i think the most consequential cost to communities is the disruption to the labor market because the illegal border crossers are coming here primarily to work. i estimate that since january, this border crisis probably has added more than 700,000 new workers to the labor market, counting both the caught and released migrants and the got aways. and they tend to be concentrated in certain parts of the country, primarily affecting those labor markets. and we can identify, as i said, the 15 counties were about 30% where the new migrants have settled, houston, dallas, the d.c. metro area, long island,

miami, palm beach, los angeles, nashville, and charlotte. some of the asylum seekers are able to get work permits, but since so many of them do not actually file asylum applications, they end up working illegally. competing directly with less educated american and legal immigrant workers and especially teens who are already some of the most marginalized workers in our economy, and who have suffered the most from the pandemic shutdowns and the consumer price inflation. study after study has found that the presence of illegal workers, and the lack of consequences for the employers who hire them is a double whammy for these marginalized workers. it's fewer job opportunities and lower wages. the fact that so many of these new arrivals are kids, and i estimate 300,000 just this year, either coming alone or with their parents, and again, they're concentrated in certain

areas, so there are plenty of school systems that know that this is a problem for them, and that know where some of these migrants are settling. it's a strain on them. the national average for student spending is over $13,000 in 2021. so this is going to cost state and local taxpayers approximately $4 billion just for the current school year, just for those who arrived this year. and that's not counting the additional services like language support, counseling, parental education, and gang prevention programs that the schools now need. and the gang issue is not a small one. roughly 30% of the ms-13 members that i.c.e. has arrested in recent years originally arrived here as unaccompanied minors. and the transnational gangs were quick to take advantage of the lenient border policies and the interior enforcement shutdown to grow their ranks here.

medical care is another big ticket item that's foisted on to the states. the migrants who can access the publicly funded safety net services for emergency and pediatric and maternity care, and, yeah, maternity care, according to one of my sources, about 30% of the female migrants who come in legally will have a child here within the first couple of years they're here, and that unlocks access to even more entitlement payments. so in addition to the emergency services, the migrants can also use the federally subsidized community health care centers that provide the full range of medical services to all uninsured regardless of their status. determining the cost is very complicated but it likely comes to more than $500 million a year just for the ones who have arrived this year. and i'm basing that on disclosures from other states that have identified these expenditures. there is an expectation and it's not an unspoken expectation

among those ngos that are involved in the resettlement of the illegal migrants that the responsibility for their long-term welfare assistance will be automatically assumed by state and local governments. and the range of services varies from place to place, and it can be a lot and it includes sometimes child care, preschool, housing, food, and even legal assistance sometimes. other people here have covered the criminal justice costs, and that is a problem not only because of the criminals coming in as got aways, but the additional drug trafficking, but unfortunately, as mr. homan said, the dramatically fewer number of deportations that are occurring now. i recently had a foia request answered by i.c.e. on deportations going up, including 2021, and there have been 70% fewer since january with the new

enforcement priorities. but i also wanted to mention the problems with crimes that are directly related to the border policies, and that's the insidious human trafficking that is absolutely enabled and facilitated by the biden policies. the placement of minors in households without due diligence, and meaningful background checks, and failing to conduct welfare checks is guaranteed to lead to disasters like the recent case we've heard about in alabama and oregon, where dozens of teens who came as unaccompanied minors were released directly to labor traffickers, which as we know, it would not meet the standards of any state child welfare placement laws. and really states should start insisting that these placements be done in accordance with state laws. and not much has changed in the five years since the senate already investigated this. in the face of these enormous costs, some states are starting to take action on their own.

notably florida governor desantis, texas governor abbott, and south carolina governor mcmaster. but they need the help of congress to see that the laws that you pass are actually enforced. but there are also some things that you can do to assist the states and to help mitigate the costs. thanks. >> okay, ms. vaughan. mr. krieger? >> i'm here before you today as a bereaved mother and cofounder of the fentanyl awareness coalition. we are a nonprofit organization comprised of three families. fighting to raise awareness of a paradigm shift which has occurred in the opioid crisis, and to educate the public on its devastating effects on countless families who have lost loved ones. the first question is, why is

this woman committed raising awareness of opioid deaths sitting in a border crisis meeting? the single worst problem caused by the border policies, a problem which dwarfs the other problems we are talking about today. flash back to 2013, and in that year, china began mass manufacturing illicit fentanyl to get a foothold in the u.s. opioid markets. we saw the results of that begin to emerge when heroin related deaths began skyrocketing. that was the paradigm shift but the salient point for today's meeting is what happened nearer to our southern border in 2018 and what was that? it was china's decision under u.s. pressure to cease all fentanyl manufacturing. instead they began mass manufacturing the precursors for illicit fentanyl and that opened the door for the world's

greatest illicit drug marketers in the world in mexico, who were never considered leading opioid manufacturers previously. those experts immediately recognized that recreational pill use in the u.s. was a diffuse market which would increase their market share by orders of magnitude. powdered illicit opioids used by those with severe substance use disorder is a market of approximately 3 million users at the very highest. those who illicitly use opioid pills or may take a pill in some approximately 50 million people, which includes millions of otherwise innocent people who may take a pill maybe just one time ever in their life. therefore, a death curve that was increasing but stable for more than 50 years has gone

completely nonlinear because it now includes hundreds of thousands of nonaddicted users, including eddie cabilis, a 20-year-old from new jersey, amanda gray, a 24-year-old college student from new york, devin noring, a 19-year-old from california, mckenzie bale, another 19-year-old from oregon, my daughter tiffany, and countless others. our coalition represents thousands of family members, and advocates across the country who want you to know that their children did not overdose. they were poisoned. when anyone disguises a harmful substance as something else or puts it into anything another person consumes without their knowledge, that's a poisoning. it's not an overdose. many of those dying today never intended to consume illicit fentanyl, yet we continue to

mislabel these deaths as overdoses, rather than what they are, illicit fentanyl poisonings. needle exchanges will not help these victims. the federal government spends $35 billion a year on this crisis. arguably our total national spending on the opioid crisis is likely close to $1 trillion dollars of economic activity. yet not one program currently in place is reaching this new group of the nonaddicted at risk, which is the fastest growing part of the death curve which has gone off the rails. what can we do for them? there are only two things. first, we can stop the illicit fentanyl from getting to them, and that is what we are here about today. the first step to solving this as a border problem is recognizing that this is by far the single worst problem we are facing because of the current border crisis, because it's impacting families directly. second, we can warn them. this is the main purpose of the

fentanyl awareness coalition. this nonaddicted population will be receptive to prevention messaging, because they are not suffering from substance use disorder. we have a lot of great ideas on how to reach them, and we could really use your support. i'm asking everyone today to please help us stop this illicit fentanyl, and launch a national level awareness and prevention campaign so that our kids have a fighting chance. young people should learn from their mistakes. they should not die from them. >> let me ask a couple of questions quickly. you know, i've seen the video of a police officer in a trunk just, you know, with the fumes or the powder and you would have died if you wouldn't have had narcan. we have heard about drug sniffing dogs dying. what is the purpose, and how are they doing it where they manufacture a fake capsule that looks like percocet or something else, why does that kill people, and why are they doing it?

>> there are a few theories on why they do it. but i think the one that seems to make the most sense is to incite addiction in otherwise healthy people. >> but if it's pure fentanyl, it kills people immediately, right? >> not necessarily. of the pills tested by the d.e.a., 40% have had a lethal amount, that means 60% of them didn't. and so you can get -- the biggest problem we have with them is they're not a homogenous mix. the fentanyl that's being put in there, they're mixing it in blenders. they're mixing it in vats. >> so it's not 100% fentanyl. >> right, so every batch is going to have, you know, lethal amounts of pills. now, why are they counterfeiting them, why are they making them look like something else, it's pretty clear that most people who don't have an addiction problem are going to just take a

fentanyl pill. that's not going to happen. so what do they do, they started it putting it in cocaine, ecstasy, traditionally nonlethal substances, they made these pills that look like a xanax, an adderall or percocet. now we have, for instance, alexander neville in california, 15 years old, couldn't understand why, he got one xanax because he was nervous about exams, and now he wants more and he wants more, and he wants more, and he doesn't how that happened. he shouldn't have gotten that rapid of an addiction if this were real xanax. he didn't get a lethal dose, but he did get enough to begin an addiction. >> that answers the question. i appreciate it. ms. coulter? >> i am dom's mom, i'm a legal immigrant who followed the law to come here. i assimilated and became a naturalized citizen. my only child, dominic, german

chocolate, was not only my best friend and the love of my life, but he was also a well-respected, contributing member of society, a caring and hard working 911 communication officer for the riverside sheriff's department in california. and he was the best friend to everybody he ever met. he not only worked long hours saving many lives, but he studied to become a motorcycle officer for the riverside pd, and then wanted to become a helicopter pilot for the same agency. he also volunteered for the local fire department and emergency response force. dominic was only 30 years young, already accomplished so much, had huge dreams, enjoying life to the fullest, and making me so happy and very proud. he was the best prankster, and had a laugh and a personality that would light up a room. his future was bright and promising, but sadly on 7/12/2012 at 5:45 a.m., his life and dreams ended and my

nightmares began. as he was riding his motorcycle to work, an unlicensed illegal alien from guatemala with two felony convictions, one deportation, two duis, on probation, turned his truck in front of my son, hitting him so hard that it killed dominic instantly. the first responders couldn't even work the horrific scene once they realized it was their friend who laid there dead, and highway patrol had to be called to take over. i was out of town and received that one phone call every parent fears, my precious dominic, my one and only, dead and gone forever. the very last time i got to see and touch my child was in a morgue, where i kissed him for the last time while trying to figure out how to continue and live life without him. the dream of one day spoiling grandkids, having him walk me