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J
eff Sessions, former Alabama senator and attorney general under President Donald Trump, said the current border crisis is allowing more criminals to enter the United States.
“You know, in poor countries, they don’t keep people in jail for 30, 40 years. They’re glad to get rid of you. So if you’re a child molesterer and the sheriff and the police chief in Honduras knows you, what are you going to do? You got a cousin in Los Angeles, you just go across the border,” Sessions said in a Sept. 29 podcast with Mark Krikorian, director of the Washington-based Center for Immigration Studies.
“So I think we are picking up a larger number of criminals than we used to in the immigration system.”
Sessions became a polarized figure among conservatives soon after he became attorney general as he recused himself from the Department of Justice’s Russia collusion investigation.
At the border, Sessions was instrumental in the “zero tolerance” policy that was enforced for about two months beginning in April 2018. The policy matched immigration law that says if individuals cross the border illegally, they must be detained.
It became known as the “family separation” policy as several hundred parents were temporarily separated from their children as all adults were detained and prosecuted for entering illegally.
The motivation behind the policy was to halt the “catch-and-release” scenario that had attracted thousands of illegal immigrants who knew they’d be set free inside the United States, despite the vast majority not being eligible for asylum.
