'He has zero operational control of the southern border': Congressman clashes with CNN host over Mayorkas impeachment

Rep. Anthony D’Esposito (R-N.Y) butted heads with CNN host Brianna Keilar over the topic of record illegal immigration at the southern border as well as the possible impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.

D'Esposito, a Republican from New York, said that Mayorkas had "betrayed" the country by letting millions of illegal immigrants and alleged asylum-seekers across the border.

Keilar questioned the congressman as to why Republicans were looking to impeach Mayorkas as opposed to attempting to work with Democrats and pass immigration legislation.

"The Republicans have laid out, over the last 13 months, a really comprehensive review and investigation into the dereliction of duty of Secretary Mayorkas. It's clear he has zero operational control at the southern border," D'Esposito declared.

"We've set new records here in the United States, and they are not ones we should be proud of. We've seen almost 3.8 million individuals that have come across our borders since the president has taken office. We have nearly 1.8 million that have come to this country, these are people that we know of," he added.

Keilar then complained that the legislation put forth by Republicans "pushes asylum-seekers to only legal points of entry and then does not increase any funding for that."

"It’s been 220 days since Chuck Schumer has received the Secure the Border Act from House Republicans. 220 days and only until recently —" D'Esposito explained, before Keilar interjected.

D'Esposito was referring to H.R.2, which prohibits "DHS from processing the entry of non-U.S. nationals (aliens under federal law) arriving between ports of entry" and also directs Homeland Security to resume the building of the U.S.-Mexico border wall.

"This is legislation that doesn’t really make sense," the host stated. "I mean your policy proposals in it are not backed up by any sort of funding that would actually pay for what you are calling to do. You want to allow children to go from being detained from three days to allowing it to be 30 days in adult detention facilities."

"What we want to do is begin to secure our border, which is clear that the Biden administration and the Democrats have failed to do," the congressman replied.

According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data, Border Patrol had more than 2 million encounters, while field operatives came into contact with another million people. This totaled over 3.2 million encounters with illegal immigrants in the United States and on its borders.

In ICE's latest statistics, it was revealed that 142,580 noncitizens were deported; a 4.4% deportation rate in relation to border encounters.

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