Homeland chief takes the blame
Kelly: Trump order should have been delayed
WASHINGTON — The nation’s top Homeland Security official portrayed himself Tuesday as a steward of President Donald Trump’s vision for border security as he laid out a path to fruition for some of Trump’s most bombastic campaign promises. He also took blame for chaos and confusion related to Trump’s travel ban.
In his first appearance on Capitol Hill, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly described plans for safeguards along the border that were more piecemeal than the “big, beautiful wall” Trump has touted.
Kelly said his agency will first build sections of wall and fencing where border agents see an immediate need and fill in gaps with ground sensors, surveillance blimps and other technologies that help detect illegal border crossings, emphasizing that the government lives in “a world of finite time (and) resources.”
“We’re not going to be able to build a wall everywhere all at once,” Kelly told the House Homeland Security Committee, adding that Border Patrol agents told him they prefer barriers they can see through rather than a solid wall.
But Kelly also said checks for the “extreme vetting” of travelers are under consideration that go further than visa officers ever have. Homeland Security may demand that some visa applicants trying to enter legally hand over passwords to their social media accounts before flying to the country.
“They don’t want to cooperate, they don’t come in,” Kelly said.
In three hours of testimony, Kelly filled in specifics on several national security goals Trump has broadly set. Kelly, a retired Marine general, also shouldered the blame for the haphazard rollout of the president’s order temporarily blocking entry for refugees and all travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries, even though he was largely left out of crafting the decree.
“The thinking was to get it out quick so that potentially people that might be coming here to harm us would not take advantage of some period of time that they could jump on an airplane,” Kelly said.
In retrospect, he said, “I should have delayed it just a bit” to prepare lawmakers and the public for the changes that were coming.
The confusion surrounding its implementation is “all on me,” Kelly said, putting himself in the position of apologizing for the execution of a directive he didn’t see until the week it was issued and wasn’t told was coming until the day before it was signed.
The writing of Trump’s order was limited chiefly to a handful of senior White House advisers, including senior aides Steve Bannon and Stephen Miller, and agency lawyers.
Lawmakers of both parties condemned the White House over its implementation.
The White House officials who directed the rollout should have come before the committee to “answer for this debacle” rather than Kelly, said Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, the top Democrat on the panel.
Committee chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, who advised Trump on the travel restrictions during the transition and defended the president’s decision to implement them, also criticized how the directive was put into action.
“The rollout of this executive order has been problematic. It has caused confusion here in Congress, across the country and around the world,” McCaul said.
Homeland Security officials were forced in the hours after the order was signed to scramble to issue instructions to border agents. Amid the uncertainty, some border agents blocked lawful permanent residents from entering the country.
Kelly defended his department’s work and insisted that Customs and Border Protection officers were not to blame for the chaos that unfolded at airports, saying the turmoil was not in immigration lines but in arrivals halls flooded with protesters and frustrated relatives of people blocked by the order.
Kelly laid out for lawmakers the timeline needed to build a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico. He said he wants to see construction of a wall “well underway” within two years. Costs have been estimated at $12 billion to $38 billion.
And echoing White House complaints, Kelly denied a report in The Washington Post that Bannon asked him to keep in place the temporary ban on green card holders being allowed into the U.S.
Rep. Kathleen Rice, DN.Y., asked whether Kelly had concerns about political advisers pressuring him to act.
“I work for one man. His name is Donald Trump,” Kelly said. “He has told me one thing: ‘Secure the border.’ ”