U.S. Senator Cruz Grills Secretary Mayorkas On His Failure To Protect America

Written by Gabriel Syme

Government officials go before U.S. Senate Committees all the time to testify about various things. When they do so, they are expected to answer the questions posed to them by our elected officials – that is the purpose of such inquiries. But lately, we have increasingly seen Democrats stonewall, obfuscate, and demonstrate an outright inability to answer basic questions about their respective jobs. A prime example of this is when U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) recently questioned the Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas, about the disaster that is the United States’ southern border.

The number of deaths, rapes, and other violent crimes against humanity at our nation’s border has skyrocketed exponentially since Secretary Mayorkas was appointed by President Joe Biden to head Homeland Security in February of 2021. Senator Cruz set out to question the secretary as to why there has been this tremendous spike in violence and crime since he took over. What resulted has become a typical sight in modern congressional hearings, with Mayorkas refusing to answer any of Cruz’s simple questions. Here are some examples:

Ted Cruz: Is there a crisis at our Southern border?

Alejandro Mayorkas: Senator, there is a very-

Ted Cruz: That’s a yes or no question.

Alejandro Mayorkas: There’s a very significant-

Ted Cruz: Is there a crisis?

Alejandro Mayorkas: Senator, there’s a very significant challenge-

Ted Cruz: Okay, so you’re refusing to answer. Well, Secretary Mayorkas, I’ll tell you someone who is willing to answer, which is your and President Biden’s Chief of the Border Patrol in a sworn deposition in July of 2022, when asked, “Would you agree, Chief Ortiz, that the southern border is currently in crisis?” Answer “Yes.” Notice none of those wiggle words, none of that equivocation. One word, one syllable, yes. Are you willing to speak with the same clarity as Chief Ortiz? Is there a crisis at our southern border? Yes or no?

Alejandro Mayorkas: Senator, I’m very proud to work alongside-

Ted Cruz: So, you refuse to answer.

Why can’t the Secretary of Homeland Security, who is tasked with overseeing border protection, give the same answer as the border patrol chief? There is only one reason: to admit there is a crisis is to admit that the Biden Administration has failed to protect our country from criminals and terrorists. Instead of doing his job, Secretary Mayorkas is playing the role of propagandist for President Biden. Believe it or not, the interview got even worse.

Ted Cruz: How many migrants died in 2022?

Alejandro Mayorkas: Approaching our southern border? 

Ted Cruz: Yes.

Alejandro Mayorkas: Precisely why we are seeking to [inaudible].

Ted Cruz: So, do you know the answer? Do you know how many died?

Alejandro Mayorkas: I do not.

Ted Cruz: You do not. Of course you don’t. I know how many died. 853. That is 853. And by the way, here are the numbers that have died every year. You go back to 1998, you see it’s consistently between 300, 400, 300, 400, 300, 400. Suddenly 2021. What happens? You get in office and that red line are dead bodies. I’ve been on the Rio Grande and I’ve seen dead bodies floating there who’ve drowned because of your refusal to do your job. You don’t even know how many have died. What do you say to the Texas farmers and ranchers who find pregnant ladies dead on their property, who find toddlers dead on their property? What do you say to them? 

How is it possible that the nation’s top National Security Officer does not know how many people died crossing the border last year? Isn’t it his job to know such things, and not only to know them but also to prevent such needless deaths? Perhaps the most striking moment in the questioning was when U.S. Senator Cruz confronted Secretary Mayorkas about the colored wristbands that the cartels use to denote how much each girl smuggled across the border is worth when they will inevitably be sold into sexual slavery.

Ted Cruz: … This is a photograph from just one day along the Rio Grande of hundreds of thousands of people walking across the border. You have allowed this to happen…what are these wristbands? (Shows a picture of colored wristbands).

Alejandro Mayorkas: I don’t know what they are.

Ted Cruz: You don’t know what they are. Mr. Secretary, you have just testified to the American people you’re incompetent at your job because I’ve been to the southern border and if you go to the southern border…you see thousands of these wristbands because the illegal immigrants wear them. The drug cartels – every color corresponds to how many thousands of dollars they owe the cartels. You have turned these cartels into multibillion-dollar criminal organizations and these are modern-day leg irons because these are children being sold into sex slavery and you don’t even know what they are. That is astonishing. Mr. Secretary, how many children have been sold into sex slavery under your administration?

Alejandro Mayorkas: Senator, we are taking it to the cartel-

Ted Cruz: How many children have been sold into sex slavery? Do you know how many children have been sold into sex slavery?

Alejandro Mayorkas: … in an unprecedented degree.

It is morally reprehensible that the man who is in charge of the security of our homeland is either completely ignorant or totally complicit in the tragedy that is right now occurring across our border with Mexico. Secretary Mayorkas should be fired for the answers he gave to this committee, but if he had any integrity at all, he would simply resign immediately.

Watch the interaction and judge for yourself:

We need men who care about the United States of America—and the lives of migrants—to step up and do something.

Donald Trump started the wall. Now we need to finish it.