Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security for Public Affairs Tricia McLaughlin described Minnesota Democratic Gov. Tim Walz’s comments comparing United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents to the Gestapo as “sickening” during a Monday Fox News appearance.
The governor made the comparison during a Saturday commencement address for the University of Minnesota law school, accusing President Donald Trump of denying those deported “due process.” McLaughlin said that “vilifying” ICE agents increased the risk of them being assaulted when “America Reports” co-host John Roberts asked about Walz’s remarks.
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“Clearly never watched ‘Hogan’s Heroes,’ it’s Gestapo,” Roberts said, correcting the failed vice-presidential nominee’s pronunciation of the Nazi secret police.
“Sickening,” McLaughlin responded. “Our ICE enforcement agents are facing [a] 400% increase in assaults and it’s because of rhetoric like this, where he’s vilifying them. They’re just trying to keep our streets safe, John.”
Trump issued several executive orders to address illegal immigration and border security, including designating Mexican drug cartels, the Venezuelan prison gang Tren de Aragua (TdA) and the El Salvadoran prison gang MS-13 as foreign terrorist organizations upon taking office Jan. 20 and invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to speed up the deportation of gang members on March 15.
McLaughlin also praised interim U.S. Attorney Bilal Essayli of the Central District of California for announcing he would be seeking arrest warrants for illegal immigrants who could be charged with felonies for illegally re-entering the United States in order to counter “sanctuary city” policies in California which lead to ICE “detainers” being ignored.
“He’s going to take the fact that if you reenter the country after being deported, that’s a felony, so they have the ability to have these criminal warrants,” McLaughlin said. “I say kudos to them. They are actually taking this out-of-the-box thinking, out-of-the-box legal thinking, and actually making American communities safer, sanctuary politicians be damned.”
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