President Donald Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order instructing the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security to expand the immigrant detention facility at Guantanamo Bay “to full capacity” to detain high-priority criminal aliens unlawfully present in the United States.
Trump announced that he would use Gitmo to house criminal illegals during the signing of the Laken Riley Act at the White House Wednesday afternoon.
“Today, I’m also signing an executive order to instruct the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security to begin preparing the 30,000-person migrant facility at Guantanamo Bay. Most people don’t even know about it,” the president said.
“These are illegal alien killers, criminals at levels that nobody’s ever seen before,” Trump added.
The Guantanamo Bay detention camp has been used to detain suspected terrorists since the George W. Bush administration. The facility currently holds 15 suspected terrorists, down from the 800 that were held during its peak during the Bush years.
“We have 30,000 beds in Guantanamo to detain the worst criminal illegal aliens threatening the American people,” Trump said. “Some of them are so bad, we don’t even trust [their home] countries to hold them because we don’t want them coming back. So we’re going to send them out to Guantanamo.”
Trump also ordered the Defense Dept. and DHS to “address attendant immigration enforcement needs.”
“This memorandum is issued in order to halt the border invasion, dismantle criminal cartels, and restore national sovereignty,” the order states.
The White House fully expects pushback from Democrats and immigrant rights groups, but believes the executive action was necessary to protect Americans.
“Today’s signings bring us one step closer to eradicating the scourge of migrant crime in our communities once and for all,” Trump said. “It’s just an unforced error that we even have to be doing this.”
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