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[Pages S2288-S2289]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
Resignation of Kirstjen Nielsen
Madam President, on Secretary Nielsen, Kirstjen Nielsen submitted her
resignation as the Secretary of Homeland Security. When we look back at
this moment, I think we are going to remember Secretary Nielsen's
tenure as a cruel chapter, in which the Agency followed through on
President Trump's worst impulses. Those include advocacy for Trump's
ineffective and expensive wall; her support for the longest government
shutdown in history that didn't produce anything for President Trump;
most regrettably, her full embrace of the child separation policy,
leading to thousands of children being ripped away from their families.
Some say Secretary Nielsen argued inwardly against some of these.
Well, she should have left a long time ago. She shouldn't be advocating
for policies that are so, so wrong. Maybe it is better, maybe it is
worse if she knew they were wrong, but it is not good, no matter what.
Through it all, in fact, she continuously misled the American public,
even insisting once that ``we do not have a policy of separating
families at the border. Period.''
Well, that was just absolutely false, and Americans from every part
of the country were just appalled by that. In fact, some people say one
of the reasons the House went Democratic is a lot of suburban
Republican women didn't like that policy, as they shouldn't have. So it
wasn't even politically as smart as maybe President Trump thought it
was.
Despite Secretary Nielsen's advocacy for the wall, for her support of
the shutdown, her embrace of the child separation policy, which she
always misled Americans about, she still wasn't radical enough for
President Trump.
As NBC News reported this morning, President Trump has urged for
months that his administration reauthorize the awful practice of
separating little, tiny children and babies from their parents.
This is further proof that the President is kowtowing to the worst
instincts of people and to the conservative, hard-right, and extreme
voices in the Republican Party, with no or little regard for our
national security or the ability to function efficiently.
What he has done by these constant firings, the constant change of
policy, has simply created chaos at the border. Nobody knows what the
policy will be from day to day and week to week and month to month. He
doesn't tell the top people in his departments that he has changed his
plans.
He fired, evidently, Mr. Vitiello, without even Secretary Nielsen
knowing about it.
This erratic, nasty style of governing is not solving any problems at
the border, and the more problems and chaos there is, the more people
are going to see it is President Trump, as President, can't solve this
problem, despite his rhetoric, where he appears tough but doesn't solve
the problem.
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