White House border czar Tom Homan upped his feud with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, saying her know-your-rights seminar for illegal immigrants will end up shielding serious criminals.
“Let me tell you something — there are a lot of sexual predators walking the street right now because of that education, because they didn’t conform to ICE arrest, because they tried to evade ICE arrest,” Mr. Homan told reporters at the White House in response to a question from The Washington Times.
“The country is much more dangerous because of that so-called education,” he added.
Mr. Homan and Ms. Ocasio-Cortez have been firing at each other since the New York Democrat created an online video she said was intended to educate potential deportation targets about their rights in refusing to cooperate with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Her video listed times and places where ICE likes to make arrests, said deportation officers “lie” about their identities, and told potential targets they have rights at home to refuse to show documents, rebuff search requests and even decline to speak to ICE officers.
Mr. Homan then said he asked the Justice Department to review the video to determine if it crossed any legal lines.
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez countered by firing off her own letter to the Justice Department, saying Mr. Homan’s move smacked of intimidation and demanded to know if she was, in fact, under investigation. She said the video was covered by her First Amendment rights and asked whether a probe was “itself a violation of the First Amendment.”
Mr. Homan on Friday said the story had been “taken so far out of context.”
He said he was asking the Justice Department for a ruling on where the line is when something crosses from education to “impedance” of ICE.
“None of us here are stupid. We know what they’re doing is teaching illegal alien criminals — because we’re prioritizing public safety threats — how to evade law enforcement,” Mr. Homan said. “Fine. Call it constitutional rights. Maybe it is. But we all know what’s going on here. So what I asked DOJ was, at what line is that crossing into impedance? I’m doing my job as border czar to make sure I give my officers in the field clear legal guidance; at what point is it impeding?”
