Biden’s ICE director admits admin ‘could have done more’ on immigration enforcement: 'It's unfortunate'

President Joe Biden’s (D) outgoing acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Patrick Lechleitner admitted that the administration “could have done more” on immigration enforcement.

Lechleitner stated in a Wednesday interview with NBC News that Biden should “absolutely” have acted sooner to increase border security.

'We could have detained more people, and we could have removed more people.'

He claimed that ICE was prevented from doing its “core mission adequately” because it was forced to redirect some of its staff to assist Customs and Border Protection amid the unprecedented crisis.

He told NBC News that “career people” within the Department of Homeland Security “would have liked” for Biden to have rolled out executive action sooner to address the situation.

“And all of us in DHS, quite frankly, I don’t know if anybody in DHS wouldn’t have wanted that earlier,” Lechleitner said.

In June, Biden released an executive order that the administration claimed would shut down the border if the number of illegal alien encounters averaged 2,500 over seven days. However, it contained several exceptions, including for unaccompanied minors, those experiencing medical emergencies, victims of a “severe form” of trafficking, and foreign nationals who made appointments through the administration’s CBP One application to request asylum.

Lechleitner claimed that Biden’s executive action reduced the monthly border encounters to 54,000. However, he did not mention the numerous so-called “lawful pathways” the administration rolled out that allowed waves of foreign nationals into the U.S. without adding to border encounter totals.

Lechleitner told NBC News that he was not surprised that Biden expressed no regrets about his actions on the border.

“It’s unfortunate because I think we could have done more,” he stated. “We could have put more resources to it, either at CBP, for the border itself, and with ICE. And we could have went and tried to get more of these individuals in the non-detained docket.”

As of July, there were more than 425,000 convicted criminal immigrants and 222,000 immigrants with pending criminal charges on ICE’s non-detained docket. In fiscal year 2024, the agency apprehended and deported roughly 47,000 foreign nationals.

“We could have detained more people, and we could have removed more people. And I think we could use more resources and support. We could have done that in the last four years,” Lechleitner continued.

He claimed that ICE’s resources are stretched too thin.

“We’re burning hot,” Lechleitner told NBC News. “We’re at maximum resource capacity. At this point, we’re going to need more money and resources to increase, and with more money and resources, we can increase detention, we can increase removal operations.”

He also appeared to criticize the Biden administration for not being more transparent about immigration issues with the public.

“They should [have] allowed us more opportunity to explain what we’re doing and explain the hard work that ICE is doing and CBP is doing,” he stated. “Let us talk. Let us demystify. Because, if not, people are going to just make their own stories up about what’s going on, and it’s going to be more problematic.”

Lechleitner claimed he was prevented from holding monthly news conferences about ICE’s operations.

He also expressed his frustration with sanctuary policies hindering ICE’s ability to find and detain illegal alien criminals.

“The American people have spoken, and hopefully, knock on wood, we’re going to get a lot more support for the workforce to do our job in a more, you know, meaningful way. But we need resources. Give us more resources. Give us more personnel, give us more support, and we can do more,” he concluded.

Lechleitner, who has been with the DHS since its inception in 2003, became ICE’s acting director in July 2023 and is now preparing to leave as Biden’s term ends.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment from NBC News.

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