On Tuesday, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said the southern border is “secure,” despite record numbers of migrant crossings.
While speaking at the Aspen Security Forum, Mayorkas was asked about the situation at the border, where agents have faced over 200,000 migrant encounters per month for the last three months.
Despite the “historic challenge,” Mayorkas claimed the border is “secure”.
“Look, the border is secure,” he said. “We are working to make the border more secure. That has been a historic challenge”.
The secretary also mentioned lawmakers who have said they will not pass comprehensive immigration legislation, reported Fox News.
“I have said to a number of legislators who expressed to me that we need to address the challenge at the border before they pass legislation and I take issue with the math of holding the solution hostage until the problem is resolved,” Mayorkas said.
“There is work to be done,” he said before noting that “safe and secure are two different words”.
“There are smugglers that operate on the Mexican side of the border and placing one’s life in their hands is not safe,” Mayorkas continued.
Mayorkas has defended his handling of the border crisis on several occasions, claiming in April that “We inherited a broken and dismantled system that is already under strain … only Congress can fix this”. “Yet, we have effectively managed an unprecedented number of non-citizens seeking to enter the United States”.
Last week, Customs and Border Protection reported that there were 207,000 migrant encounters at the border in June, compared to approximately 189,000 in June last year.