During Tuesday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Your World,” DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas addressed concerns about the exemption for unaccompanied children in President Joe Biden’s immigration executive action potentially being exploited by cartels. He stated that “We are taking it to the cartels.”
When asked if there was a risk of cartels taking advantage, Mayorkas replied, “Absolutely not.”
Mayorkas continued, “Neil, we deal with unaccompanied children in a humanitarian way, adhering to our values. We deter irregular migration, we build lawful pathways, we have programs for minors.”
Cavuto interjected, “But this encourages drug cartels to take advantage of those kids, does it not, sir?”
Mayorkas answered, “Neil, we’re taking it to the drug cartels with unprecedented strength through our Transnational Criminal Investigative Units, through our Immigration and Customs Enforcement.”
Cavuto pressed further, “No, no this is actually a green light for those cartels, isn’t that the fear, that this is actually greenlighting and [they’ll] say, oh, guys, well, we can use these kids as pawns to get what we want?”
Mayorkas reiterated, “Neil, let’s be clear, the cartels and smuggling organizations are unscrupulous. They exploit individuals of all different types of vulnerabilities. We are taking it to the cartels. We exempted unaccompanied children from this asylum bar because of the compelling humanitarian picture they present. We’re going to adhere to our values while we take tough enforcement measures, which is what we have done.”
