Acting DHS Secretary McAleenan told the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday that a whopping 90 percent of illegal immigrant asylum seekers do not show up for their scheduled court hearings.
“It depends on demographic, the court, but we see too many cases where people are not showing up,” McAleenan said. “Out of those 7,000 cases, 90 received final orders of removal in absentia, 90 percent.”
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) asked, “Ninety percent did not show up?”
“Correct, that is a recent sample from families crossing the border,” responded McAleenan.
On Monday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that President Trump’s recent deal with Mexico will enable the United States to return asylum seekers to Mexico at “full throttle.”
Pompeo said those crossing over the U.S.-Mexico border will be “rapidly returned” to Mexico where they can wait for the outcomes of their asylum claims.
At a press conference, the Secretary of State said:
Those crossing the U.S. southern border to seek asylum will be rapidly returned to Mexico where they may await their adjudication of their asylum claims. We’ve seen this before. We were able to do this to the tune of a couple of hundred people per day [before the deal].
We now have the capacity to do this full throttle and engage this in a way that will make a fundamental difference in the calculus for those [migrants] deciding to transit Mexico to try to get into the United States. This full-blown effort under the Migration Protocols [Remain in Mexico] is a big deal and was something that we worked on very, very diligently with our Mexican counterparts over two days. And we will pursue other cooperative efforts too.
On Friday, President Trump announced that the he had reached a deal with Mexico after threatening to impose tariffs on the country unless it did more to curb the massive influx of illegal immigrants into the U.S.
“I am pleased to inform you that The United States of America has reached a signed agreement with Mexico,” the President wrote on Twitter. “The Tariffs scheduled to be implemented by the U.S. on Monday, against Mexico, are hereby indefinitely suspended. Mexico, in turn, has agreed to take strong measures to stem the tide of Migration through Mexico, and to our Southern Border. This is being done to greatly reduce, or eliminate, Illegal Immigration coming from Mexico and into the United States. Details of the agreement will be released shortly by the State Department. Thank you!”
