Rep. Mike Collins (R-GA) appeared to suggest migrants should be extrajudicially murdered in a social media post on Thursday.
Collins made the post on X in response to another post by Rep. Anthony D'Esposito (R-NY), who was reacting to a Fox News clip of an arrested immigrant in a Lakers jersey, giving a double middle-finger salute to the cameras as he was being led away.
"We feel the same way about you," wrote D'Esposito. "Holla at the cartels and have them escort you back."
ALSO READ: ‘Abuse’: Politicians are fretting about AI stealing their faces and voices
"Or we could buy him a ticket on Pinochet Air for a free helicopter ride back," replied Collins.
Collins is referring to right-wing Chilean strongman Augusto Pinochet, who seized the country in a 1973 coup and became infamous for his government's so-called "death flights," where civilians kidnapped by the armed forces were thrown out of helicopters into the Pacific Ocean.
President Joe Biden and a bipartisan Senate coalition have been working on a compromise to reform asylum and border security policies in response to a surge of migrants for which the current legal system is not equipped. However, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), at the urging of former President Donald Trump, has already declared the bill dead without even having seen the text.
