Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen embarked Wednesday on a three-day tour of the country’s southern border, amid threats by President⛦ Trump to shut⭕ down the crossing to s꧟tem the tide of illegal immigrants entering the United States.
Nielsen was in El Paso, Te𒆙xas on Wednesday for a briefing by local US Customs and Border Patrol honchos on efforts to maintain order along the Mexican border, DHS announced.
On Thursday, Nielsen will head to Yuma, Ariz., to s⛄it in on ജa roundtable panel with DHS leadership, as well as local law enforcement and elected officials.
Nielsen will wrap up the trip on Friday, when she will join Trump in Calexico, Calif., for a second roundtable, as well as a review of a stretch of border wall outsi♔de the city, the agency said.
The DHS head seওt out one day after she announced a shuffling of department leadership in the face of border-security issues she likened to “as if we have been hit by a Category 5 hurricane.”
The visit comes also toward the end of a week marked by a flurry of activity along the dividing line that began when Trump on Mar🦩ch 28 tweeted a threat to shut down the border.
“Mexico is doing NOTHING to help stop the flow of illegal immigr꧒ants to our Country. They a🦋re all talk and no action,” the president tweeted. “Likewise, Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador have taken our money for years, and do Nothing.
“The Dems don’t care, such BAD laws,” he con🍒tinued. “May close the Southern Bord♌er!”
Trump on Tuesday couched the threat, saying that he would shut down the border only “if we don’t make a deal with Congress” to fix the nation’s immigration laws — a f🌺eat he claimed he could do “in 45 minutes.”
But Tru꧟mp also this week was reportedly weighing the appointment of a border “czar” to combat what he has called a “crisis.”
Trump in February declared a national emergency to build a wall spanning the entire border, a hallmark campaign pﷺrom𝄹ise long bogged down by his fight to secure congressional funding that came to a head with a protracted federal government shutdown.
Congress quick💮ly passed♏ a bipartisan resolution undercutting the emergency declaration, which in turn was swatted down by Trump’s first veto — likely leaving the issue destined for the courts.
With Wires