Republicans repeatedly misrepresented statistics about immigration and crime in the course of the affirmation listening to for Donald Trump’s decide to run the Division of Homeland Safety on Friday, giving a preview of the baseless fearmongering that’s prone to be an indicator of the incoming administration.
The lawmakers questioning South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, Trump’s decide to supervise the division that runs border and inside immigration enforcement, claimed the Biden administration has “let in” hundreds of murderers and tons of of suspected terrorists over the previous 4 years — however that’s not true, in keeping with knowledge from the identical division Noem is hoping to run.
After one senator requested Noem about homegrown terrorism — in mild of two latest lethal incidents carried out by Americans — Noem modified subjects, saying, “We all agree that the No. 1 threat to our homeland security is the southern border.”
It’s not true that “everyone agrees” with Noem. Within the final 50 years, there hasn’t been a single American killed in a terrorist assault carried out by somebody who entered america illegally, in keeping with Alex Nowrasteh, vice chairman for financial and social coverage research on the libertarian Cato Institute, who has spent years learning immigration and crime.
Individually within the listening to, Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) claimed Alejandro Mayorkas, the DHS secretary underneath President Joe Biden, had “allowed” round 400 folks on the terrorism watch record, formally referred to as the “terrorist screening data set,” to “come into this country illegally.” Noem cited related figures.
This seems to be a misrepresentation of immigration knowledge. U.S. Customs and Border Safety statistics refer to not folks “allowed” into the nation, however moderately to “encounters” between U.S. officers and folks attempting to cross the border at or between ports of entry. In different phrases, CBP counts the people who find themselves stopped by border brokers.
In accordance to DHS, noncitizens on the watch record who’re encountered at a port of entry “are most commonly found inadmissible to our country and immediately repatriated or removed,” and those that enter the nation with out inspection “are most commonly detained and removed or turned over to another government agency for subsequent detention and law enforcement action, as appropriate.”
Notably, Noem modified her wording when referring to the DHS knowledge, relying on the president: She mentioned the Biden administration had “let in” folks on the watch record, however that in the course of the Trump administration, folks on the record “were then removed from the country and faced consequences.”
Republicans’ deal with folks on the watch record sneaking in over the southern border can be deceptive. In line with the identical DHS knowledge masking the final seven years, encounters with folks on the watch record largely occurred at ports of entry on the Canadian border, except for fiscal years 2019 and 2021, once they largely occurred at ports of entry on the southern border.
Not everybody on the terrorism watch record is a terrorist. The record consists of “known or suspected terrorists,” or KSTs, in addition to folks merely “associated with” KSTs, together with their relations. And whereas there are a handful of remoted examples of individuals on the record having the ability to get into the nation after arriving on the border, they’re all topic to arrest and expulsion.
Andrew Harnik through Getty Photos
Lastly, Noem and Moreno went forwards and backwards over a quantity Trump repeatedly lied about on the marketing campaign path: that Mayorkas had “let in about 12,000 murderers.”
Moreno seemed to be referring to knowledge from Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s “non-detained docket.” Knowledge launched final yr by ICE, which is housed inside DHS, confirmed there have been 13,099 folks on ICE’s non-detained docket as of July. It could sound like that docket describes folks strolling free across the nation, however that’s not the case — it solely describes people who find themselves not detained by ICE.
Many on the docket are presently serving jail time in federal and state establishments, and DHS notes that “most noncitizens who are convicted of homicide are typically not eligible for release from ICE custody.”
Moreno additionally claimed the DHS numbers described individuals who had been “let in” to the nation in the course of the Biden administration — however in actual fact, that 13,099 tally covers a long time. The variety of folks with felony convictions on the non-detained docket did enhance some in the course of the Biden administration, but it surely additionally went up in the course of the first Trump administration.
As NBC Information reported, “A 2016 DHS Inspector General’s report found there were 368,000 criminal immigrants who were not detained by ICE. According to ICE’s fiscal year 2023 budget justification, there were 405,786 convicted criminal immigrants on the non-detained docket as of June 5, 2021, just under five months after Trump left office, indicating many crossed during the Trump administration. As of July of [2024], according to the data provided by ICE to Rep. [Tony] Gonzales, over 435,719 convicted criminal immigrants were on ICE’s non-detained docket.”
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Translation? Republicans grossly misrepresented numbers, but once more, to fearmonger about 12,000 on-the-loose murderers.
