Department of Homeland Security border czar Tom Homan spoke briefly to reporters Wednesday morning, April 23 at the White House after a TV hit, pool reporter Emily Goodin of the Daily Mail recorded his comments. 

FYI Homan’s hometown is Sacket Island, NY, on the shore of Lake Ontario, just a few miles from the westward tip of the Swanton Sector of the U,.S. Border Patrol.

Brief: Says deportations are saving thousands of lives. Asks media concerned about due process, ‘Where were you’ when border crossers brought fentanyl and trafficked human beings? Says, ‘maybe we gotta hold off on some of the deportation operation. But it’s not gonna stop us….’

He was asked about the 27 people with ties to the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua and Anti-Tren being indicted in NYC on racketeering, sex trafficking, drug, and firearms charges in New York: 

“That’s a classic example how collaboration between ICE and state and local law enforcement – the success of the collaboration. 27 Tren de Aragua people are indicted. I believe six are still standing orders for that. But we send a strong message to Tren de Aragua. 

“We’re going to keep doing this. … That was the first time we used RICO. The underlying offenses were sex trafficking, gun trafficking, drug trafficking, murder for hire. We seized a lot of weapons and rescued some victims of sex trafficking. What’s specifically important to me about New York is Mayor Adams, who’s getting beat up by the left for cooperating with us. Look what, look what transpired. Look at the lives we saved in the New York City. Right at the same time you got the City Council file a lawsuit to shut down our memorandum of understanding – the executive orders he signed to get us in Rikers Island. 

“We proved yesterday what collaboration can do to the safety and security in New York. But now the city council wants to lock us out of Rikers Island where TDA and MS 13 house so we can get custody of them before they hit the streets in New York. It’s just ridiculous. 

“Of course, no city council members at the press conference yesterday.  They don’t want to hear the truth. This is about open borders. This is about sanctuary cities. Sanctuary cities are for criminals, and I salute Mayor Adams. … I think we’ll win that case. I hope the judge who’s going to hear that case saw the press conference yesterday and see the results of collaboration. Cops should be working with cops. 

“I never asked New York City, NYPD, to be an immigration officer. I asked them to help us be cops working with cops to remove public safety threats and national security threats and terrorists from the streets of New York and from Rikers Island when they’re done with their sentence. That’s exactly what we proved yesterday.”

On the Kilmar Abrego Garcia a case, he was asked about a judge accusing the administration of bad faith: 

“Bad faith? We removed an MS-13 gang member, public safety threat, wife beater, designated terrorist from the United States. He’s home. He’s a citizen El Salvador, a of native El Salvador, who had due process, despite what you’re hearing. … The best that could happen for him, if he actually gave back the United States, he would be detained and removed again because he has an order of deportation. What people don’t talk about, the withholding order, they keep saying was the mistake or oversight was issued years ago under different circumstances. The gang he was afraid would attack him no longer exists. The country of Salvador is a much safer country because of the actions of President Bukele. I don’t think any court can order another nation, a sovereign nation, to take a citizen national of their country and their custody and come back to us. Again, I’m not an attorney. I’ll let DOJ argue this in court, but I think we remove the public safety threat, gang member designated terrorist from the United States who have been ordered deported twice by a federal judge. I think he got plenty of due process. He got more due process than Laken Riley got.”

Asked about the Supreme Court order that administration facilitate Garcia’s return: 

“I’ll leave that to the Department of Justice and the State Department. I think I stand by – we did the right thing for the safety and security of this country. .. These are two plane loads of terrors and international orders. Again, I’m not I’m not litigating the case. I’m not an attorney. I’ll let DOJ handle that. But again, I think we’re keeping President Trump’s promise to the American people who voted into office on number one issue, secure the border and then remove public safety to address the national security. That’s what we keep doing.  

“I find it incredible that there’s all this push for more and more and more due process, more process for these designated terror groups, when, in fact, no one asked for due process when they crossed the border? No one asked for a vetting when they crossed the border? 

“Where was all the media? … Where were you all folks when we had 10.5 million people come to the border in your asylum? Where were a lot of these folk when you had 600% increase in sex trafficking, women and children?  Where was everybody when we had a quarter million Americans dying from fentanyl that come that open border? Where’s all the anger, where’s all the press then?

“It’s just, it’s just ridiculous how this has come full circle, and I think President Trump’s doing the right thing and this country’s much safer today. I looked at numbers today. We’re about 68,000 illegal aliens arrested in the interior United States – a hell of a lot more than Biden administration ever done, ever thought of doing?  …

“This country is a lot safer. New York City is lot safer today because the operations we did up there, arresting public safety threats and national security threats. Every time we arrest one of these people, when we remove them, the country gets us more safe. President Trump secured a quarter in matter of seven weeks. 

“Today, as I’m talk to you, we have the most secure border in the history of this nation. The data proved it. He did in seven weeks what Biden administration couldn’t or wouldn’t do in four years, this President is keeping his promised American people. I’m happy. I walk in there every day working for the greatest president of my lifetime, because I spent over 40 years doing immigration enforcement and border security. We’ve never been where we’re at right now, the most secure border in the history of the nation right now. Lives are being saved every day.”

More: 

“They want to say our administration is inhumane, we’re not giving due process.  We’re saving lives by the thousands. Every day. The wall, everybody’s screaming and yelling about the wall going up. Every place we build a border barrier, illegal Immigration went down, illegal drug flow went down. But, you know, what no one talks about – the wall saves lives. Women and children can’t get over that wall, so that means they’re going to a place where there’s not a wall and what’s waiting on them, the men and women of the border patrol who’s going to deal with those health issues and the humanitarian crisis. Walls save lives. Secure borders save lives. President Trump saving thousands of lives every day by securing that border. And we’re going to continue, despite what the district court says. 

“Maybe we gotta hold off on some of the deportation operation we’re doing. But it’s not gonna stop us from seeking these people now, arresting them and take them off the street to United States while we’re waiting for the courts to decide. You know about the Alien Enemies Act and these other things. We’re gonna keep doing what we’re doing. We’re gonna arrest these public safety threats every single day. 24-7 across this country. That will not stop.”

Asked how many people used the CBP app to self report: “I don’t have that number right now.”

Here is the footage of the gaggle via our friends at CSPAN: https://www.c-span.org/program/white-house-event/tom-homan-on-kilmar-abrego-garcia-deportation-case/658975