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DHS Sec.: Trump admin. 'gutted' immigration system

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Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas says immigration was "gutted" by the Trump administration. After 27 days in office, Mayorkas told reporters: "It takes time to build out of the depths of cruelty," (March 1)

Video Transcript

ALEJANDRO MAYORKAS: We are dedicated to achieving, and quite frankly, are working around the clock, to replace the cruelty of the past administration with an orderly, humane, and safe immigration process. It is hard, and it will take time.

To put it succinctly, the prior administration dismantled our nation's immigration system in its entirety. When I started 27 days ago, I learned that we did not have the facilities available or equipped to administer the humanitarian laws that our Congress passed years ago. We did not have the personnel, policies, procedures, or training to administer those laws. Quite frankly, the entire system was gutted.

It takes time to build out of the depths of cruelty that the administration before us established. They need-- they need to wait. It takes time to rebuild the system from scratch. If they come, if families come, if single adults come to the border, we are obligated to, in the service of public health, including the health of the very people who are thinking of coming, to impose the travel restrictions under the CDC's Title 42 authorities and return them to Mexico. And we have done that.

We need individuals to wait. And I will say that they will wait with a goal in mind. And that is our ability to rebuild as quickly as possible a system so that they don't have to take the dangerous journey and we can enable them to access humanitarian relief from their countries of origin.

- Do you believe that right now there is a crisis at the border?

ALEJANDRO MAYORKAS: I think that the-- the answer is no. I think there is a challenge at the border that we are managing, and we have our resources dedicated to-- to managing it.

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