WASHINGTON — In the first House Homeland Security hearing on immigration since Republicans’ decisive 2024 election victory, both sides of the aisle derailed a conversation on migrant children trafficking to debate their administrations’ respective immigration records.
Clashes within the committee over the choice of witnesses, the evidence presented and representatives’ questioning led to verbal confrontations, while many Republican committee members left the hearing room before speaking their turn during witness questioning.
While members on both sides of the aisle agreed the trafficking and exploitation of migrant children is a pressing issue, Democratic members said placing the blame on President Joe Biden’s administration was counterproductive to its resolution.
“It didn’t start all of a sudden one day on January 20, 2021,” Rep. Tom Suozzi, D-N.Y., said. “It’s gone on for decades, and we spent all of our time blaming each other and pointing at boogeymen instead of doing our jobs in the United States Congress.”
The hearing, jointly led by the Subcommittees on Border Security and Enforcement and Oversight, Investigations, and Accountability, contained witness testimony from whistleblowers, researchers and people from government oversight organizations.
A key tension point revolved around the risks of U.S. sponsors taking custody of unaccompanied migrant children.
Congress granted the Office of Refugee Resettlement custody of unaccompanied migrant children in 2002. Their responsibility includes placing them with U.S.-based sponsors that have undergone background checks and completed risk assessments.
As of Nov. 1, 2024, the Department of Health and Human Services has 6,148 unaccompanied children in their care, with the average length of stay under the ORR’s care being 34 days. The ORR plans to expedite this process further, raising concerns about placing children in dangerous scenarios due to insufficient sponsor vetting.
Witness Tara Lee Rodas, an HHS whistleblower, said the HHS does not have the resources to properly vet U.S. sponsors as it is “not an investigative or law enforcement agency.”
Both Rodas and witness J.J. Carrell, a documentary maker and former Border Patrol officer, testified that the Biden Administration had lost over 320,000 unaccompanied migrant children after placing them with U.S. sponsors.
They appeared to be referencing a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement report from August 2024, which said more than 32,000 unaccompanied migrant children did not attend their immigration court hearings from 2019 to 2023, putting them at higher risk of exploitation and trafficking. The report said the number may have been greater if ICE had given notices to appear to more than 291,000 unaccompanied children remaining in the U.S.
Discord started with the introduction of Carrell, due to past incendiary comments and the content of his written testimony, in which he accused Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas of treason for their handling of the Southern border.
“Here in Congress, we don’t accuse sitting presidents, sitting vice presidents or members of Congress of treason,” Subcommittee Chair Rep. Lou Correa, D-Calif., said.
Carrell’s posting history on the platform X, also drew sharp criticism from Rep. Delia Ramirez, D-Ill., who called attention to a post he made in early November saying deportations under the new Trump administration will be “swift, but deadly” and should take “violence and deadly force.”
“I have no questions for you. No one serious about our role here should be asking you questions,” Ramirez said to Carrell.
Claims made by Carrell and fellow witness Alicia Hopper, a human trafficking researcher for Sadulski Enterprises, were also questioned by both sides of the aisle. In their testimony, both made reference to criminal organizations targeting unaccompanied migrant children heading to the United States for organ harvesting.
When asked to give further details on organ harvesting schemes by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., Carrell could not give specifics.
Democratic lawmakers challenged Republicans’ convictions against migrant child trafficking, bringing up their support for President-elect Donald Trump’s family separation policies and his plans to resume the agenda in his upcoming term.
“My Republican colleagues pretend to care about children, but their actions say otherwise,” Rep. Yvette Clarke, D-N.Y., said.
Ramirez said Republicans shouldn’t use the abuse migrants have faced as a political attack, due to her family’s personal experience with immigrant exploitation long before the Biden administration’s border policies.
“I don’t want to hear about one woman being raped crossing that border. My mother experienced it while pregnant with me, crossing that border,” Ramirez said.
While Ramirez said she would gladly work with her Republican colleagues if they want to pass solutions for migrant children in the upcoming administration, she disagreed with their language and motivations in discussing the problem.
“If all we’re going to continue to do in this committee is bring people here who continue to dehumanize children and families who are risking everything because they have lost everything crossing that border, then I’m going to continue pushing back,” Ramirez said.
