While giving testimony to Congress this past Wednesday, Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz expressed that the Department of Homeland Security has absolutely zero operational control of the U.S. southern border while under the leadership of President Joe Biden, a bold claim which sits directly against the statements being issued by the Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas.
Ortiz issued these remarks as part of a hearing hosted in McAllen, Texas, of the House Homeland Security Committee that was carried out in response to a question coming from Chairman Mark Green regarding the security of the U.S.-Mexico border.
“Does DHS have operational control of our entire border?” questioned Green.
“No sir,” answered Ortiz.
Behind Green was hung a post board that explained that “operational control,” as it is defined in U.S. law textbooks, is “the prevention of all unlawful entries into the United States, including entries by terrorists, other unlawful aliens, instruments of terrorism, narcotics and other contraband.”
Green then showed a video clip during the hearing which showed Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) questioning Mayorkas this past year about whether or not the U.S. maintained operational control across the entire southern border. “Yes, we do,” proudly exclaimed Mayorkas. “Yes, we do. ”
Green then questioned Ortiz about whether he thought Mayorkas had been lying at that time, to which Ortiz responded by stating that the term operational control was utilized by officials in order to measure whether or not they were truly being successful. He stated that now their most recent strategy was “geared towards mission advantage.”
Ortiz once again confirmed that DHS does not maintain any sort of operational control of the southern border, but once he was pressed about the topic of Mayorkas lying to them, Ortiz quickly and politely attempted to dodge the questions in an obvious effort to not express a negative opinion of his boss.
????????: Border Patrol chief Raul Ortiz just told @RepMarkGreen that DHS *does not* have operational control of the southern border.
This is huge, because Secretary Mayorkas recently said DHS did have operational control. Huge admission. pic.twitter.com/rDezfonqST
— John Cooper (@thejcoop) March 15, 2023
The hearing took place just as the administration has been forced to deal with a record-shattering tsunami of illegal immigrants flooding into the U.S. under its watch which is largely taking place because the policies enacted by Biden seem to be acting as magnets for the cartel smugglers and migrants.
A report from the New York Times indicated this past year that the Mexican drug cartels went from pulling in roughly $500 million per year due to their human smuggling operations back in 2018 to where its sits now at $13 billion for their human smuggling operations in 2022, a spike of well over 2,500%.
