Fox News White House correspondent Peter Doocy confronted White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Monday about the tens of thousands of illegal immigrants convicted of homicide freely roaming throughout the U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) recorded a total of 13,099 illegal immigrants convicted of homicide are currently roaming the U.S. as of July 21, according to a Wednesday letter delivered to Republican Texas Rep. Tony Gonzales. Jean-Pierre claimed the data presented by ICE is a “false representation” of reality.
“Thirteen-thousand people who’ve been convicted of murder crossed the border illegally and are living among us,” Doocy began. “So how much danger are U.S. communities in right now because of this?”
“I think it’s important to correct the record here, first of all, the false representation of the data ICE shared, so that’s what we’re seeing, false representation. I got to call that out,” Jean-Pierre said. “We got to call that out, and this has been fact-checked by some of your colleagues here, by multiple, multiple, multiple outlets. That has been debunked on what has been falsely misrepresented here, so we have to call that out.”
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The press secretary explained that the number of illegal immigrants convicted of these crimes that are out in the open is misleading. She argued that agencies must assure they are not “lying” to the American people.
“If we’re going to report something, and data that’s out there, we got to do it in the way that is not confusing the American people and certainly not lying,” the press secretary continued. “And so, this has been fact-checked, and so the way that is being falsely represented here is just not okay and I got to be really clear about that.”
Among those also roaming freely are 15,811 illegal immigrants convicted of sexual assault and another 14,301 convicted of burglary, according to the letter. Over 662,566 non-citizens with criminal histories were on ICE’s national docket as of July 21, according to the letter.
Among those are 435,719 convicted criminals and another 226,847 who have pending criminal charges, according to the letter.
The agency further detailed how sanctuary cities are making it difficult for agents to arrest convicted migrants as these cities allegedly ignore detainer requests for criminal aliens.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security told NBC News that the data is being misrepresented as those numbers go back four decades. It is not currently clear when the first of the 13,000 illegal migrants convicted of homicide crossed into the U.S.
Jose Ibarra, an illegal immigrant from Venezuela, is charged with murdering 22-year-old nursing student Laken Riley outside of the University of Georgia’s campus in February. A 23-year-old illegal immigrant named Victor Antonio Martinez-Hernandez was arrested in June for the alleged rape and murder of 37-year-old Rachel Morin.
(Featured Image Media Credit: Screenshot/White House press briefing)
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