A top federal prosecutor in Texas lashed out at CBS News’ “60 Minutes” over its report on the deportation of a Texas father who had lived in the United States for 25 years, accusing the program of “fake news” and telling those in the country illegally, “Don’t be here in the first place.”
U.S. Attorney Aaron Reitz took particular issue with the program’s description of the deported man as a “Texas father.”
“This happened in my district,” Reitz wrote Monday on X, saying “60 Minutes” “is reporting fake news.”
“As @DHSgov and @ICEgov have already made clear, this guy was not a ‘Texas father,’” he continued. “He’s an illegal alien whose very existence on American soil violated federal law every second of every day for 25 years.”
Reitz then offered a curt retort to anyone worried about the administration’s deportation policies.
“Don’t want to get caught up in the government’s fully legal third-country removal policy? Don’t be here in the first place. Easy,” he wrote.
A federal court has ruled that policy unlawful, and an appeals court upheld that ruling last month. The Supreme Court has allowed the deportations to continue until it hears the case in December.
Reitz, a former chief of staff to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and a former top aide to Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, was sworn in as U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Texas in July. He declared the U.S. “a nation of LAWS” and took aim at Uber, asking why the company allows “illegal aliens with orders of removal” to drive on its platform.
The “60 Minutes” report Sunday night profiled Moussa Diawara, 57, an Uber driver with no criminal record. His wife and two children are U.S. citizens. A U.S. immigration judge ruled in 2012 that he could not be deported to his native Mali. Even so, after his arrest in July, he was flown to Ghana, and he says Ghanaian officials then forced him onto a flight to Mali. He told CBS he feared persecution there because he had converted to Christianity.
Diawara acknowledged the U.S. had a right to deport him, but not to Mali, and said he believes officials knew Ghana would send him there. His DHS-issued bag tags listed his destination as Mali, though DHS said the tags were “produced by contractors” and called a medical form listing Mali a “clerical error.”
Immigration and Customs Enforcement also attacked the CBS report Sunday night.
“One problem. The illegal alien claimed he was a HOMOSEXUAL in order to try and dodge deportation to Mali,” ICE wrote on X.
Diawara’s attorney has asked a federal judge in Washington to order his return to the United States.
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