House Judiciary Committee chair Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, on Thursday announced the committee has subpoenaed Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas for documents and communications relating to the migrant situation at the southern border.
In a six-page letter accompanying the subpoena, Jordan railed at inaction, accusing Mayorkas of stonewalling information.
Jordan's letter notes the panel has been trying to get migration data that includes a January event at Eagle Pass, Texas, where Border Patrol agents allegedly cut and removed razor wire put up by the state of Texas.
Texas officials had cordoned off Shelby Park and stationed state National Guard units at the location to block anyone — including Border Patrol agents who hadn't been granted prior approval — from entering.
In September 2023, a migrant influx so overwhelmed Border Patrol agents in Eagle Pass that the Department of Homeland Security closed two of the city's three international bridges, shutting down commerce, the Jordan letter said.
"While thousands of illegal aliens flooded into Eagle Pass, the Biden Administration's DHS cut and removed concertina wire and fencing installed as a deterrent by the state of Texas, helping the aliens cross illegally," Jordan wrote.
"The Committee then wrote to DHS to request information about this event, which serves as a microcosm for the border disaster broadly, and made other related requests regarding the Biden Administration's policies which reward, rather than deter, illegal immigration."
He said his panel got no answer until Jan. 2, when DHS offered an "in-person, operational briefing set to occur the following week."
"The Committee attempted multiple times to schedule the briefing, but days later DHS retracted its offer," stating DHS "trusts the Committee has the latest operational updates" from a congregational briefing.
Jordan complained DHS didn't clarify why it offered an operational briefing in the first place if it thought briefing members at the Speaker's Congressional Delegation "served as compliance with the Committee's oversight."
"For months, the Committee has in good faith attempted to work with DHS to prioritize its requests," Jordan wrote. "However, in the more than three months since the Committee's initial request, DHS has produced nothing in response."
Fran Beyer ✉
Fran Beyer is a writer with Newsmax and covers national politics.
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