The next is the total transcript of an interview with Homeland Safety Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” that aired on Dec. 22, 2024.
MARGARET BRENNAN: I need to discuss to you broadly concerning the setting we’re in. It is a fairly vital one. Your potential successor, Kristi Noem, Donald Trump’s choose to run Homeland Safety, has no regulation enforcement expertise and has by no means labored at an company like this. Have you ever spoken to her but? And what do you suppose her largest problem might be?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: I’ve. I’ve spoken with the governor. We had a really optimistic dialog. We’re each completely aligned on our dedication to a clean and efficient transition. I care very deeply concerning the well-being of this division, dedicating so a few years to public service, she expressed her dedication to the well-being of this division. She is a governor, so she is aware of find out how to lead, and I’m optimistic and hopeful and devoted to her success.
MARGARET BRENNAN: There have been hiccups with transition to this point, by way of even simply the knowledge that’s being shared due to these lack of signing off on paperwork at sure authorities businesses. What’s it going like? How clean is it right here?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Right here, the transition staff has landed on the Division of Homeland Safety. We’ve got begun to supply paperwork and supply info to the transition staff. I occurred to run into the transition staff chief yesterday right here at DHS headquarters and- and we’re working effectively collectively.
MARGARET BRENNAN: However do you’ve a way but of what issues might be like? You stated you are apprehensive concerning the division. There is a vow to chop again on bureaucrats. Do you suppose numerous these employees that you simply say you are devoted to will not have jobs in a couple of months?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Oh, I hope that is not the case. We’re, fairly frankly, a perennially under-resourced division. You understand, folks check out our funds and, and take into consideration how massive it’s, however one has to measure how massive it’s in comparison with what the mission calls for are, and people mission calls for are extremely huge. Our division is a sprawling one. Our mission is very various. In fact, the border receives quite a lot of consideration, however the cyber safety challenges, the legal investigative work that we carry out, the catastrophe response that we execute, maritime safety, our United States Coast Guard, our protecting mission by United States Secret Service. We have been talking earlier of TSA and a lot extra. Our department- the problem for the governor coming in is to deal with such a various set of missions, however luckily, she’s going to be capable of depend on terribly devoted and proficient specialists on this division. We can not afford to lose any.
MARGARET BRENNAN: This can be a heightened risk setting on the international entrance, on the home entrance, we just lately noticed that killing of the United HealthCare division CEO on the streets of Manhattan. Manhattan prosecutors referred to as it a killing that was supposed to evoke terror. Would you take into account him a terrorist? Is that this home violent extremism?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Properly, Margaret, it isn’t for me to touch upon a pending legal case, I cannot do this. Initially, allow us to take a step again and observe the great tragedy. A father of two kids, a household man was murdered in New York Metropolis in chilly blood, at first. Secondly, you spoke of the heightened risk setting, the rhetoric on social media following that, that homicide is very alarming. It speaks of what’s actually effervescent right here on this nation, and sadly we see that manifested in violence, the home violent extremism that exists. The specter of it in the US is without doubt one of the nice risk streams that we should counter. In fact, there’s additionally the specter of international terrorism, in addition to the actions of antagonistic nation states.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Once you say one thing’s effervescent, what is the nationwide development that you simply’re seeing?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: I- look we have now been involved concerning the rhetoric on social media for a while–
MARGARET BRENNAN: –And that is towards CEOs, that is towards the federal government, that is towards management.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: We have seen narratives of hate. We have seen narratives of anti-government sentiment. We have seen private grievances within the language of violence, accompanying or being part of these narratives, is one thing that we’re very involved about, that, that may be a heightened risk setting. I nonetheless am alarmed, although, by the the the heroism that’s being attributed to an alleged assassin of a father of two kids on the streets in New York Metropolis.
MARGARET BRENNAN: And numerous that appears to be across the healthcare business and what that firm was doing, it is depersonalized. The sufferer is depersonalized.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: And and the sufferer is an individual–
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: And the sufferer is a husband, and the sufferer is a father.
MARGARET BRENNAN: I ask you a few development, as a result of usually these items are mentioned in purely political phrases, as political violence, but it surely looks like you are saying it is virtually broader.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Oh it’s. It’s. It isn’t purely a political rhetoric. We see a variety of narratives that’s- that basically drive some people to violence, and we have now a duty to know the risk panorama and see what we are able to do working with communities to forestall that violence from truly occurring.
MARGARET BRENNAN: I imply there have been stories in the course of the hurricane aftermath in North Carolina about militias searching for FEMA employees, for federal response employees.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: So we needed to pull FEMA employees out of the sphere who have been responding to victims’ wants due to false info that was intentionally disseminated on social media, similar to, ‘the FEMA employee is coming to take your land.’ Completely false. They’re there at nice private sacrifice to assist others. That is who they’re. And we needed to pull them from the sphere by motive of that risk setting, quickly, albeit, however however impactfully.
MARGARET BRENNAN: That simply reveals a large not simply distrust- however you have been apprehensive about the specter of violence towards them
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: We most actually have been. And I’ve to inform you, the FEMA worker who’s engaged in a search and rescue mission doesn’t ask concerning the political get together of the person whom that FEMA worker is rescuing.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Properly, mustn’t.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: That’s- and doesn’t, and that may be a rescue operation.
MARGARET BRENNAN: We talked about how broad your portfolio is. So I need to transfer to a different a part of that, the US border. ‘Face the Nation’ has been to the border, toured a number of the federal amenities, and we noticed a few of these babies who got here throughout with out dad and mom and with out caregivers. And I do not think- I actually will not ever overlook that. There have been additionally kids who have been separated from their households by the Trump administration. The final report we noticed reveals that Homeland Safety reunified simply wanting 800 kids with their dad and mom. Why is it so arduous to reunite households, and the way a lot unfinished enterprise are you abandoning right here?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: So we’re very pleased with the work that we carried out via the Household Reunification Activity Power, a multi-agency effort that I led right here within the Division of Homeland Safety. However there’s extra work to be carried out. A number of the dad and mom who have been eliminated are troublesome to search out. Some are reluctant to return ahead, apprehensive that the separation might happen once more. We’re coping with weak populations who’ve gone via trauma. So there are a myriad of challenges, a few of which we have now been capable of overcome, as you observe, for 800 or so households, however there’s extra work to be carried out.
MARGARET BRENNAN: What number of are left?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: It’s unclear, as a result of the- we weren’t left with good data, information was not saved, and in order that was additionally one of many nice challenges that we needed to overcome. We couldn’t have carried out our work, what we achieved, with out the partnership of teams in the neighborhood that had different connections to separated households.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Non-government businesses. ICE was additionally unable to account for greater than 32,000 unaccompanied children who failed to seem in court docket from 2019 to 2023 in line with the report we learn. The incoming border czar, Tom Homan, says these kids are being exploited and trafficked. Is that true?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Properly, we–
MARGARET BRENNAN: Are you aware?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Margaret, we actually have acquired stories of youngsters being trafficked, even these as to whom we all know the place they’re. That’s exterior the duty of the Division of Homeland Safety. What we do is we flip kids over inside 72 hours, because the regulation requires, to the Division of Well being and Human Companies, after which HHS locations these kids. In fact, we examine circumstances of trafficking, however there are kids who’re reunited with a dad or mum right here in the US or a authorized guardian, they usually transfer and generally the federal government loses observe. People don’t adjust to the reporting obligations or in any other case, I believe it’s inaccurate to say that every one of them are trafficked or victimized. There are a selection of the explanation why we would lose observe of a person that isn’t essentially particular to this administration. That has been an extended standing problem within the immigration system, one instance of why that system is so damaged, why the length of time in proceedings is unacceptably lengthy and must be remedied. Keep in mind, we’re coping with a system that was final reformed in 1996.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So what extra are you able to do to fight the trafficking that’s occurring of a few of these kids, or the exploitation of a few of these kids, is that as much as Congress as effectively, or can Homeland do extra effectively?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: We’ve got carried out extra. As a matter of truth, our total worksite enforcement technique has been to focus our legal investigators and our different officers on employers who exploit weak people, together with underage people, and benefit from the very fact they that they’re migrants in search of work in the US and pay them substandard wages, have them employed in substandard working situations and the like. And so that’s the place we have now, I might submit accurately, centered our energies, and we have been unprecedented in that focus and within the success of that focus. We want extra sources. The issue of the-
MARGARET BRENNAN: It is a cash drawback?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: We want extra personnel. We actually do.
MARGARET BRENNAN: However the exploitation of them, are you restricted in your authorities at this level, when the Trump administration guarantees they’ll change it? Can they alter it?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: This was a- this has been an issue that has been many years lengthy. This isn’t a brand new drawback. I want them great success. I’ll assist them of their efforts to finish the scourge of human exploitation and human trafficking.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So at this level final 12 months, in December of final 12 months, border crossings have been at document highs. Now they’ve dropped to the bottom degree of the Biden administration. How a lot of that drop off is as a result of Mexico is now stopping migrants from even attending to that southern border with the US?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: That’s critically one ingredient of it. It isn’t the one ingredient of it. The President took decisive motion after politics killed what would have been a very enduring resolution to what’s a damaged immigration system, that bipartisan laws that I used to be very proud to be part of would have- would have actually delivered an answer. As a result of politics killed it, the President took government motion in June of this 12 months, we started to execute very efficiently and really quickly that government motion. And that has been a key driver of the- the low variety of encounters at our border we are actually delivering to the incoming administration, a southern border at which the variety of people encountered is effectively beneath the extent skilled in 2019 the final 12 months earlier than the pandemic.
MARGARET BRENNAN: However the immigration surge into the US since 2021 has been the biggest in American historical past.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Sure
MARGARET BRENNAN: That’s unbelievable. So–
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Oh, it’s Margaret. It’s one ingredient of the best displacement of individuals on this planet since World Warfare Two. This can be a phenomenon that has not been distinctive to the southern border of the US. It- it’s one thing that has gripped your complete hemisphere and the world. After I converse to our companions from the 5 Eyes, our closest allies, Canada, the UK, Australia, New Zealand, they increase immigration as the primary challenge of concern to them. That is one thing not distinctive to the US.
MARGARET BRENNAN: It is not and it has great political affect.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: It has an incredible political affect, and that’s the reason we want Congress to behave in the- in the- within the wake of Congress’s failure to behave, the President took government motion, and subsequently we’re delivering to the incoming administration a border that’s safer than it was in 2019.
MARGARET BRENNAN: However the Biden administration, and I believe you’ve stated to me, one of many very first issues the Biden administration did was ask Congress to behave within the earliest days, after which quick ahead, you had this bipartisan close to miss on a border invoice all that point handed, why wait till 5 months earlier than the US election to place in place these asylum restrictions that did minimize off the stream? That ended the disaster?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Margaret keep in mind the place we have been when the President took workplace. We have been within the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. The prior administration had imposed title 42 which is a public well being authority, and enabled us to expel people, to proceed to expel people on the border, because the prior administration had carried out. There was great stress to keep up the workings of Title 42 which we did. Keep in mind- and that was stress to keep up Title 42 a bipartisan stress that–
MARGARET BRENNAN: — Which was pinned on the CDC as a well being measure. However positive, sure.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: That held till Might of 2023 and we ended the workings of Title 42 as a result of this nation had escaped the throes of COVID 19 extra quickly and extra efficiently than any nation within the hemisphere and, fairly frankly, the world. We then turned to Congress and we requested for supplemental funding that was desperately wanted to make our administration of a damaged immigration system work significantly better. We have been denied. We went again to Congress a second time and requested supplemental funding. Denied, regardless of a determined want for it. We then turned to the bipartisan negotiations, which proved profitable, which have been then killed. The results of it, a very terrific resolution was killed by irresponsible politics. Trying again now in hindsight, in 2020 if we had identified that irresponsible politics would have killed what was clearly a meritorious effort and a meritorious end result, maybe we might have taken government motion extra quickly.
MARGARET BRENNAN: As a result of Republicans argue on this forwards and backwards over whose job it’s to repair the issue, Congress would argue there was government authority that would have been used earlier than Congress legislated, they usually level again to the disaster, beginning at day one, when Trump-era immigration coverage was peeled again. Stay in Mexico, the 100 day moratorium on most deportations that was introduced, the halt to wall development. Did these measures, and I do know you were not but in workplace, personally, however did these measures set you up for failure?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Keep in mind one thing, Stay in Mexico is touted as the nice panacea. In 2018, and I might be approximate in my numbers Margaret, in 2018 there have been roughly 550- 560,000 people encountered on the southern border. Stay in Mexico was carried out in January of 2019. In 2019 there have been roughly 960- 970,000 people encountered on the southern border. The development traces of migration have been rising fairly exponentially from 2018 to 2019 and that’s mirrored worldwide. After which the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Keep in mind one thing additionally concerning the government motion that the President took in Might- in- in June of this 12 months. We additionally, over time, constructed capabilities that we didn’t beforehand have. Not simply domestically, the variety of amenities that we stood up, the flexibility to move people and decompress areas that have been experiencing surges of people, however our negotiations with Mexico, with different international locations in Latin America and all over the world. We are actually eradicating or returning extra people in three years than the prior administration did in 4. And we’re doing so not solely larger in quantity, however larger in pace, due to the negotiations with different international locations and to extra international locations than has ever been the case. We’ve got been eradicating Chinese language nationals who don’t have any lawful foundation to stay in the US again to the Folks’s Republic of China for the primary time since 2018 and we have now run a variety of elimination flights to that nation.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Properly, why did not we hear extra about these enforcement actions in the course of the election cycle, when immigration was so key?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Margaret, we have been executing on enforcement at an unprecedented degree all through this administration. And ICE simply printed information that evidences that fairly powerfully.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah, on that information. So, President Obama was referred to by activists because the deporter in chief, due to the big variety of deportations on his watch. However that information you simply cited reveals deportation of migrants is at a ten 12 months excessive beneath President Biden. A ten 12 months excessive. So what shifted at DHS that- that prompted this deportation of greater than what 200,000 unauthorized migrants from the US this 12 months. That- that is one of many highest numbers in current years–
SECRETARY MAYORKAS:– Margaret–
MARGARET BRENNAN: — If Congress did not provide the energy, how did you do it?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Margaret, we did it with ability, with technique, and with unflinching dedication to that mission, and let me share with you, I’m an immigrant to this nation, and what this nation gave me drove me to public service. I spent my first 12 years in authorities service as a federal prosecutor, and the conclusion that I’ve lived and the conclusion that defines this nation is the next, that we’re a nation of legal guidelines and a nation of immigrants, and if people should not have a lawful foundation to stay in the US, we’ll take away them.
MARGARET BRENNAN: However it will additionally counsel that there’s the flexibility to do it with out Congress performing, proper? That is the draw back of exhibiting you may make it work.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Sure- however Margaret, we made these very spectacular statistics occur. However there may be rather more work to do, and what we have now to do is to make sure that the issue doesn’t proceed. This damaged system must be fastened. And it isn’t simply to make sure that people who should not have a lawful foundation to stay in the US are eliminated, but it surely’s additionally to make sure that we’re offering humanitarian reduction to those that qualify one in all our proudest traditions, and that we’re additionally fueling the economic system. Our want for expert labor is one thing that we hear from firms and public officers, no matter get together affiliation, and but we’re capped on the variety of expert employees that we are able to introduce into the US economic system. By figures, by ceiling set in 1996.
MARGARET BRENNAN: You are speaking about H-1b visas and expert employee visas, issues like that.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Sure.
MARGARET BRENNAN: However by way of the enforcement actions right here, Goldman Sachs estimates greater than half of the migrants since 2021 entered illegally. Does that sound correct to you? Roughly 5 million folks entered the US illegally?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Keep in mind, a sure quantity have been encountered on the border. However we have now, as you cited earlier, we have now eliminated, returned and expelled, given the operation of Title 42 in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, a unprecedented quantity, and we proceed to return or take away people. However there isn’t any query, there isn’t any query, and this can be a signal of a damaged immigration system- that people who have been encountered on the border are in the US, however they’re in immigration enforcement proceedings. One of many issues is that these proceedings take seven to 10 years earlier than they’re resolved, as a result of our immigration court docket system is so backlogged, and that backlog has been rising 12 months, over 12 months, over 12 months, ever since I can keep in mind and I entered the Division of Homeland Safety for the primary time in 2009.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Properly, Donald Trump says inside the first 100 days, they’ll have a surge of sources via Congress to hold out what he’s calling mass deportations. The previous ICE chief Tom Homan, who used to work with you.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Sure.
MARGARET BRENNAN: We went again and seemed. He is praised you. He stated, “Me and Ali did not at all times agree on immigration, however he listened. He is an incredible American, and he loves this nation.”
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: That’s, that’s true. That’s-
MARGARET BRENNAN: — Loads has changed–
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: I really like- I really like this nation. I’ve labored very intently with Tom Homan, and I am very pleased with the work that he and I carried out collectively.
MARGARET BRENNAN: However he stated you had a the place he advised Tucker Carlson, you two had a falling out over transgender coverage and ICE detention amenities, and he was pressured to signal one thing that offered medical care to them. Is that the way you keep in mind issues and- and that is the one who might be a part of finishing up the insurance policies you say should be fastened?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: I used to be disillusioned to be taught of that assertion that is not true.
MARGARET BRENNAN: That wasn’t a falling out between the 2 of you?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: No, I did not have a falling out with- with Tom Homan. We labored very effectively collectively all through my tenure because the Deputy Secretary of the Division of Homeland Safety. I used to be disillusioned to listen to that.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Is that simply politics?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: I- I can inform you this, it isn’t true. No matter it’s, shouldn’t be true.
MARGARET BRENNAN: You will have been the recipient of numerous upset over the immigration coverage due to your job. You’re the face of it, proper? And the Republican Home impeached you. I ponder if you depart this workplace, are you involved about your private safety?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Margaret, I am extremely pleased with the work that this division has carried out over the previous 4 years as I have been privileged to function its secretary. I am very unhappy to depart the division, and it mirrors the disappointment I’ve felt every time. I’ve left the federal authorities as a political appointee. I began as a profession appointee. I’ve- I place confidence in the American folks. That religion is after we see a cold-blooded homicide of a United Well being Care government, it’s- it is rattled, however that is the actions of a- of a person not reflective of the American public and of the democracy by which we reside. I’m the face- I’m the face of it, and that may be a duty I willingly assumed once I agreed to take this place.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah, it is a query. And you already know why I needed to ask it due to the setting we’re in. I need to ask you about China, if I might, earlier than we go. You stated just lately that this huge Chinese language hacking often known as Salt Hurricane, the hacking of eight telecom firms that siphoned up this metadata, the cellphone name data, logs and knowledge for thousands and thousands, doubtlessly of People, was accessed. Why hasn’t the US authorities stopped it?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Properly, to begin with, the intrusion is a really vital one and a very impactful one and a completely unacceptable one. And the President has demonstrated a powerful response to the Folks’s Republic of China. It is vitally sophisticated–
MARGARET BRENNAN: — Rhetorically?–
SEC. MAYORKAS: I am sorry,
MARGARET BRENNAN: Rhetorically? When he met with Xi Jinping?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Properly, only recently, the US Division of Commerce proposed an motion towards China Telecom. So that is an ongoing scenario. It isn’t static. The intrusion is a really refined one. The telecommunications firms are working very vigorously to remediate it. They’re working in partnership with us, with the cyber safety and infrastructure safety company inside the Division of Homeland Safety, with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and different businesses of the federal authorities. So this can be a partnership in an effort to remediate the scenario. It is vitally sophisticated, and we’re very devoted to it.
MARGARET BRENNAN: That is the biggest intelligence compromise, doubtlessly in US historical past.
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: It’s a very critical compromise, and requires very critical motion to remediate and get well from it, and likewise very critical response to it.
MARGARET BRENNAN: How did you discover it?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: That isn’t one thing I can- I can converse to.
MARGARET BRENNAN: The incoming nationwide safety advisor to Donald Trump, Mike Waltz was on Face the Nation final Sunday and stated the US must go on offense, begin imposing increased prices and penalties to folks and entities like international locations stealing information, but additionally to those that spy on us they’re, “actually, placing cyber time bombs on our infrastructure, our water programs, our grids, even our ports.” A cyber time bomb. Is that what’s occurring?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: You- we began our dialogue talking a few heightened risk setting, and I recognized three vectors, three major vectors, the specter of international terrorism. And clearly we’re keenly centered on the instability in Syria, and whether or not that may create some area for the reemergence of ISIS there. And international terrorism is, in fact, the founding motive for our Division of Homeland Safety, the specter of home violent extremism. And we have talked about that and I discussed the actions of antagonistic nation states. It’s actually a unprecedented time now. Opposed nation states have exhibited a willingness to make use of the cyber area in an effort to. To threaten our homeland safety and our nationwide safety. The infiltration, the hack of the telecommunications firms is one instance. We have seen vital infrastructure hacked as effectively, and it does require a response, and I’m assured that the incoming administration might be vigilant in executing that response.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Would you place that on the high of the record for the incoming Secretary?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Would put that on the high of the record. Whether or not it is on the very high, I might need to suppose via, however it’s on the high of the record most actually.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Lastly, as you come to the time, as you come to the top of your time right here, what’s the factor that retains you up at evening?
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Margaret, we- it isn’t singular. It is not singular. Our mission area is so huge. Our mission is so various. There are challenges in every space of this division. In case you requested me for an embracing concern, it’s the security and safety of the American folks that’s our dedication, and making certain that that’s preserved and never in any method encroached upon, is our highest obligation, and I am extremely proud to serve it.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Mr. Secretary, thanks to your time. Thanks,
SECRETARY MAYORKAS: Thanks, Margaret.
