Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin accused Democrats who support abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement of being “anti-law enforcement,” in comments made during an event with Breitbart News on Tuesday in Washington, DC.
Asked what Democrats might do to DHS if they regain control of Congress following this year’s midterm elections, Mullin told Breitbart’s Washington Bureau Chief Matt Boyle that protecting the homeland “should never be controversial” and framed opposition to the agency as part of a broader political strategy.
“We have the job of protecting the homeland and it should never be controversial … what it really comes down to is they’re anti-law enforcement,” Mullin said.
“My theory behind that is … the only way you can take a Republic and turn it into a socialist, communist country, is you’ve got to fabricate chaos. If there’s no chaos, you’ve got to create the chaos.”
Mullin’s comments follow a press conference last month in which Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) and Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-IL) called for abolishing DHS and ICE, along with all immigration detention facilities.
“Today we are saying we want to abolish ICE,” Ramirez said at the event. “We’re saying we want to end the detention that is creating profits for corporations at the expense of our very own family, friends, and neighbors.”
Ramirez, who sits on the House Committee on Homeland Security, argued the department should be dismantled over what she described as a lack of accountability.
“I am clear that DHS must be held accountable for their violence,” Ramirez said. “They’ve never demonstrated commitment to our rights, to due process, to the rule of law, or human dignity, and we know that an administration and their cronies that are profiting off our pain are not those that are going to center humanity. And DHS must be dismantled.”
Jayapal, for her part, called for the release of immigrants currently held in federal detention and criticized conditions inside detention facilities.
“We are here today to say this simple message: Shut it down. Shut it down. Shut down the private for-profit detention centers. Stop the incarceration of 65,000 immigrants in these for-profit facilities every single night, at enormous cost to taxpayers and enormous cruelty to detainees,” Jayapal said. “Stop treating people like animals with rotting food, dirty and insufficient water, and terrible medical care. We demand justice and accountability for all of this, and we will shut it down.”
The exchange underscores a growing divide between the Trump administration’s DHS leadership and progressive Democrats ahead of the midterm elections, as immigration enforcement remains a flashpoint issue in Washington.
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