Chip Roy explodes at DHS secretary over border crisis: 'You're ignoring the actual truth'

Texas Congressman Chip Roy unloaded on Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas Thursday, accusing the secretary of failing his duties to uphold the law and maintain "operational control" of the southern border.

Roy, a border state Republican, is part of a group of lawmakers planning to impeach Mayorkas should the GOP regain the House majority after the midterm elections. When the secretary testified before the House Homeland Security Committee Thursday, Roy pressed him to state, under oath, whether the U.S. has "operational control" of the southern border in accordance with federal law.

"Yes, we do," Mayorkas answered.

But an incredulous Roy read the statutory definition of "operational control," which according to the Secure Fence Act of 2006 means, "the prevention of all unlawful entries into the United States, including entries by terrorists, other unlawful aliens, instruments of terrorism, narcotics, and other contraband."

He also read from federal law that says any alien making an asylum claim with a "credible fear of persecution ... shall be detained for further consideration of the application for asylum."

Roy asked if migrants making asylum claims are currently being detained as required by federal law, and Mayorkas said they are not.

"As a matter of fact congressman, that is an issue that is before the United States Supreme Court," the secretary said, but again Roy interrupted him.

"The fact of the matter is our law says they should be detained and your agency is releasing people on purpose in order to flood the zone and make sure that more people can come to the United States," Roy charged.

"Congressman, are you actually interested in the facts and the law?" Mayorkas asked after Roy berated DHS for the department's catch-and-release policy.

"I'm reading you the law and I'm actually talking to you about the facts about who's entering this country," Roy said, while Mayorkas shook his head, looking resigned.

As Roy continued, a Democratic congresswoman asked if the secretary would be permitted to answer his questions and committee chairman Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.J.) attempted to tell Roy his time was up, but the Republican from San-Antonio was not finished.

He held up pictures showing the cost in human life brought by the U.S. government failing to secure the border, including a mobile morgue carrying 27 dead bodies, more dead bodies discovered by Texas ranchers living near the border, a little girl who was branded by human traffickers, and photos of Americans who died from overdoses from fentanyl smuggled into the country by transnational drug cartels.

Yelling, Roy asserted that DHS policies were "encouraging cartels, encouraging people to come here, harming Texans, and harming this country."

"You know it!" he thundered, pointing a finger at Mayorkas. "And you're ignoring the actual truth!"

"The time for the gentlemen has expired, he no longer has time to slander the secretary," Nadler interjected, which prompted an angry reaction from Roy.