According to the Washington Examiner, two Yemeni men who are on the federal terror watch list were arrested at the U.S. border earlier this year.
A Biden administration press release announcing their apprehensions was apparently taken offline on Monday, however — and now, House Republicans want to know why.
A statement that was reportedly posted to the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) website detailed two arrests, one in January and one in March. It was first posted Monday, but taken down just hours later, the Examiner reported.
A spokesperson for the agency told the Examiner that the “news release in question was not properly reviewed and contained certain disclosure and policy information related to national security that required CBP to remove it from our website.” In the eyes of many in the GOP, however, it’s just another example of a lack of transparency from the Biden administration.
“Transparency in name alone”
A Twitter account maintained by Republican members of the House Homeland Security Committee had charged Tuesday that President Joe Biden’s “reckless border security policies” were hurting “Americans across the country.”
President Biden’s reckless border security policies continue to put Americans across the country in danger. Enough is enough. It’s time for the Biden Admin to get serious about stopping the surge. #BidenBorderCrisis https://t.co/unbR2CVIHk
— House Homeland GOP (@HomelandGOP) April 6, 2021
The next day, the House Security Committee Republicans asked the CBP and the Department of Homeland Security outright:
Why did you take down your previously public tweet [and] press release announcing that two people on the terror watch list were apprehended exploiting President Biden’s open border policies?
The Homeland Security panel’s GOP members added: “Transparency in name alone is not transparency.”
“Rushing it all at once”
According to a Tuesday report from Fox News, other members of the GOP in Congress had drawn attention to the Yemeni men’s arrests following the CBP’s announcement; meanwhile, Democrats sought to downplay its significance.
In a press conference with reporters, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) said it’s important to remember that potential threats don’t just come in through the southern border.
“When you go out to Monument 3 and you talk to those agents, it’s not just people from Mexico or Honduras or El Salvador, they are now finding people from Yemen, Iran, Turkey,” McCarthy said, according to Fox. “People on the terrorist watch list they are catching and they are rushing it all at once,” the California congressman added, criticizing Biden’s border policies.
Rep. Veronica Escobar, a Democrat from Texas, swiftly dismissed McCarthy’s concerns, accusing him of trying to “fuel the divisions” in the U.S. and heighten fears related to immigration, as Fox reported.
The post House Republicans want answers after CBP deletes press release on arrests of alleged terrorists first appeared on Conservative Institute.
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