North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis criticized Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in a U.S. Senate hearing on Tuesday for her handling of the Department of Homeland Security and federal immigration enforcement.
In a 10-minute monologue, Tillis said Noem has not responded to his four-page letter sent in February requesting information on Border Patrol’s November operation in Charlotte. Tillis asked that the information be provided before Noem's testimony on Tuesday.
“I'm expecting answers to Charlotte's Web; I requested it a month ago,” Tillis said. “All I asked for, if it had to be anonymized, was information so that I could determine if your hit rate is right. I want to find more of those people, and I want to detain fewer of the others.”
Tillis, in the letter, asked DHS to provide encounter-level data on agents’ interactions with the public, including whether force was used, whether U.S. citizens were involved and how agents justified each stop.
Tillis, a Republican, also criticized Noem over her leadership in Minneapolis, where federal immigration agents shot and killed two U.S. citizens. Tillis said he is against illegal immigration and supports federal immigration agents, but said Noem’s department is too focused on hitting arbitrary quotas.
“We just want numbers," Tillis said. "We want 1000 a day, 6000 a day, 9000 a day, because numbers matter, right? No, they don't matter. Quality matters.”
Tillis said if he doesn’t get responses to his inquiries, he will block future nominations and disrupt other Senate business.
