(The Center Square) – U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, is demanding answers from Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas about how many illegal border crossers are being flown across the country on the taxpayers’ dime who pose national security threats.
His call came as the greatest number of individuals on the U.S. terrorist watchlist have been apprehended under the Biden-Harris administration of at least 1,856, and members of Congress continue to sound the alarm about tens of thousands of “Special Interest Aliens” being apprehended, The Center Square reported .
Cruz requested information from Mayorkas after a DHS Office of the Inspector General audit identified ongoing problems at a major international airport where hundreds of illegal foreign nationals weren’t vetted but still were released into the country. OIG audits have consistently found that U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents weren't properly screening and vetting noncitizens prior to releasing them into the country and were releasing known and suspected terrorists into the country because of "ineffective practices and processes," The Center Square reported .
Cruz pointed to these reports as well as another that hundreds had bypassed Transportation Security Administration security to gain access to secure airport areas. He also pointed to Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Christopher Wray testifying before Congress more than once about elevated national security threats, terrorism concerns and hundreds reportedly in the country with connections to the Islamic terrorist organization ISIS who came through the U.S.-Mexico border.
The Biden-Harris administration’s “open border policies are weakening airport security in at least three ways, Cruz says. First are the unprecedented number of “improperly vetted aliens flying into U.S. airports via parole programs,” he says, pointing to what is now over 530,000 flown into the U.S. from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela. An additional 813,000 inadmissible foreign nationals used the CBP One app arriving at ports of entry, according to CBP data. They were processed for entry through programs Mayorkas created.
Multiple states sued to stop them, arguing they are illegal. House Republicans argue they’re illegal and impeached Mayorkas for them and other actions he took that they say created the border crisis. The Democratic-led Senate refused to hear the charges, which Cruz said was a “a travesty to the United States Constitution and it was a travesty to the American people.”
The millions who’ve been released into the country through Biden-Harris policies are deemed inadmissible, the US House Committee on Homeland Security has said in numerous reports. According to internal DHS documents, nearly 96% of all inadmissible illegal border crossers who received a CBP One app appointment were released into the U.S., the committee found .
Despite Mayorkas’ claims those being released into the country had passed “rigorous biometric and biographic national security and public safety screening and vetting,” a DHS OIG report found that CBP “could not access all biometric data for complete screening and vetting” of everyone using the CBP One app.
Many arriving through one parole program (CHNV) have been connected to violent crimes committed against Americans, The Center Square reported .
Another problem creating security risks for Americans are city officials housing illegal border crossers at airports, Cruz argues. He cited an example of an Ecuadorian illegally in the country who was living at the John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York who broke into a secure area, armed with scissors and a box cutter.
He also raised concerns about “the number of improperly vetted aliens who have illegally crossed the border increases the likelihood of an attack on or in domestic airports” but were released into the country’s interior without identification, and the now more than 2 million gotaways , those who illegally entered and evaded capture.
Cruz requested information about illegal foreign nationals being flown to and or housed in the Boston Logan International Airport, Chicago O’Hare International Airport, Chicago Midway International Airport, and John F. Kennedy International Airport as well as those receiving shelter from the city of Chicago, Massachusetts Port Authority, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, and the Federal Aviation Administration.
He requested this and other information by Sept. 10, a deadline that has come and gone.
“DHS has confirmed receipt of our letter but has failed to provide a substantive response at this time,” a spokesperson from the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation told The Center Square. Cruz is the committee’s ranking member.
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