WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, on Wednesday joined Newsmax’s “Spicer & Co.” and on Thursday joined Newsmax’s “The Balance” to discuss the Biden administration’s refusal to answer questions about basic information on apprehensions at the U.S. border.
The senator also sent a letter to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas demanding that he answer questions about the border crisis after failing to provide that information at two congressional hearings.
The full interviews can be found here and here, excerpts are below.
On the administration’s lack of transparency:
“One reason I was so insistent is we had Secretary Mayorkas before our committee via video about a month or so ago and I asked him pretty much the same questions. He didn’t have the answers that time. You know, I gave him questions for the record, which he didn’t respond to, and so you’re coming into hearings yesterday in the Senate, today in the House, you got to know that you’re going to be asked that question. How could you not come prepared with that basic information?” (Sen. Johnson, ‘Spicer & Co,’ 9/22/21)
“I’m quite confident that DHS knows exactly how many people have been returned, how many people are in detention, how many people have been dispersed throughout America. He doesn’t want the American public to know, President Biden doesn’t want the American public to know because if the American public understands the true extent of this crisis, they will be outraged and they hopefully will hold this administration accountable.” (Sen. Johnson, ‘The Balance,’ 9/23/21)
On Biden’s border crisis:
“This crisis has been building. The last six months we’ve averaged over 5,500 people per day. The last two months it’s been over 6,700 people per day being apprehended, and that doesn’t count the 800 to 1,100 known ‘got-aways,’ so this crisis is building and they just can’t deny it. I mean, they’re giving us those numbers and again, so they know the macro numbers, they know the breakdown. They just don’t want to let America — they want America to think that they really are handling this, they’re processing efficiently, they’re returning people under Title 42. They may be returning some; they don’t want the American public to understand the full extent of how many people are coming in this country illegally and being dispersed without notice to the communities or to the states.” (Sen. Johnson, ‘Spicer & Co,’ 9/22/21)
“When Secretary Mayorkas said, I mean, one truthful thing he said is they’ve got a plan and they’re executing the plan — and their plan is completely open borders. That’s the plan and they are executing it. What they weren’t counting on is that there would actually be news media coverage of this. Now, they’re absolutely right that the vast majority of mainstream media has ignored this, but you’ve got, you know, outlets like Newsmax that are actually paying attention to it, and we have enough freedom of the press still that the American people are understanding this. Then you have pictures like in Del Rio that are outright shocking, but even there I have to point out the 15,000 people under that bridge in Del Rio — that’s only a couple days flow.” (Sen. Johnson, ‘Spicer & Co,’ 9/22/21)
