Republican Senators were stunned on Thursday when homeland security chief Alejandro Mayorkas insisted the surge of juvenile migrants began under President Donald Trump.
“The surge of unaccompanied children… had begun in April 2020, many months before we took office,” said Mayorkas, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.
Mayorkas repeated the claim at least three times and was echoed by Democrats, including committee chairman Sen. Gary Peters (D-MI).
“I’ve had respect for you, as you know, Secretary,” Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH) responded to Mayorkas. “But I’m not able to sit here and not comment on this idea that somehow this is Donald Trump’s fault,” he told Mayorkas, whose credibility has already been damaged by a series of misstatements, including his May 11 claim that “The border is closed.”
“I’ve got a chart … [with] got total apprehensions at the border, and shows clearly — it’s galling quite honestly to hear that this is a crisis inherited by this administration,” responded Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI). He continued: