By Steve Neavling
Just days before the U.S. House begins impeachment hearings against Alejandro Mayorkas, the Homeland Security secretary met with Border Patrol agents in Texas and defended his record.
Mayorkas rejected Republican claims that his agency has been passive as migrants enter the country illegally.
He also blamed Republicans in Congress for stalling on a measure to provide emergency border security funding to hire new agents and asylum officers and to set up inspection devices meant to detect fentanyl at ports of entry.
“We are doing everything we can within a broken system,” Mayorkas said, the Houston Chronicle reports. “We will continue to do everything we can, and we will continue to enforce the law. But we need Congress to make the legislative changes and provide the funding that our front-line officers so desperately need.”
Impeachment hearings are set to begin with a hearing Wednesday. Republicans are accusing Mayorkas of “egregious misconduct and refusal to enforce the law” in connection with immigration policy.
During a trip to the border last week, Republicans alleged Mayorkas violated his oath to defend the U.S.
“The greatest domestic threat to the national security and the safety of the American people is Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas,” U.S. Rep. Mark Green, R-Tenn., said during a news conference in front of the Rio Grande.
Border crossings reached record levels last year.
Border Patrol agents need more money to enforce the law, Mayorkas said.
“We need more officers so that migration surges do not force mitigation measures of last resort like bridge closures,” Mayorkas said.
He added that the Biden administration has taken “bold, necessary action during the time that Congress has failed to act.”
