Kristi Noem pressed on CNN on huge cost of detaining migrants at Guantanamo Bay
CNN's Boris Sanchez pressed Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on Wednesday on the administration's intention to detain undocumented migrants at the U.S. facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
President Donald Trump made the announcement Wednesday before signing the Laken Riley Act into law.
"We have 30,000 beds in Guantanamo to detain the worst criminal illegal aliens threatening the American people. Some of them are so bad we don't even trust the countries to hold them, because we don't want them coming back," Trump said.
Sanchez asked Noem, "Can you tell us more about those plans, what the options are, who would be detained, and whether military personnel might be involved?"
"Well, President Trump did talk about that a little bit at the ceremony. Just talked about the fact that there might be some resources that could be established for the worst of the worst at Guantanamo Bay, and that's something that he is evaluating, along with our team at the Department of Homeland Security. But today was really about Laken."
ALSO READ: Top GOPer's ‘most immediate’ priority for new committee includes probing a MAGA conspiracy
Later in the interview, Sanchez asked, "I do want to ask you about how this sort of detainment is going to be funded. There are some estimates that have this new framework for detainment costing something like $83 billion over the next three years. The bill doesn't outline how exactly that's going to be funded, so I wonder, where is that money coming from?"
Noem answered, "Well, to start standing up some of these detainment centers, we're using operations and budget that we already have in place, but we will need more help. We will need more dollars from Congress and the reconciliation process is going to be utilized to have that debate on Capitol Hill. We've got senators and representatives that recognize that in order to do this and to fix the situation that the Biden administration perpetuated, we're going to need the resources not only to incarcerate and go out and get these dangerous individuals off our streets, we're going to have to detain them, put them through a process to repatriate them back to their home countries."
The Wall Street Journal reported, "Pentagon officials said they were unaware of the plan. The plans for Guantanamo Bay were completed on Wednesday, according to White House officials. Housing thousands of migrants would require construction of temporary housing and other facilities at the base."
Watch the clip below via CNN.