Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis vowed Wednesday to deport the illegal immigrants who have entered the U.S. under President Biden and said he won’t grant amnesty to a single unauthorized migrant.
“Biden’s let in 8 million people,” he said. “They all have to go back.”
Speaking at a Republican presidential debate in Des Moines, Iowa, he promised to out-tough former President Donald Trump in finishing the border wall and stepping up deportations.
“Donald Trump deported fewer people than Barack Obama did when he was president,” Mr. DeSantis said.
Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, the other GOP hopeful on the stage, also blasted Mr. Trump for falling short on immigration policies during his term in office. And she said the current population of illegal immigrants needs to be ousted.
“You have to deport them and the reason you have to deport them is they’re cutting the line,” she said.
She touted the immigration bill that she signed into law in South Carolina during her tenure as governor, calling it the stiffest state-level law at the time. She said the Obama administration sued to stop her, and she beat them in court.
Ms. Haley said a key part of the state law was requiring businesses to use E-Verify, a federal system for checking new hires’ work authorization. E-Verify is currently voluntary at the federal level, but she said it needs to be made mandatory to dry up the jobs that attract illegal immigrants.
As president, she said she would deploy new Border Patrol agents and deportation officers, defund sanctuary cities and restore the Trump-era “Remain in Mexico” policy that disrupted bogus asylum claims and helped solve the 2019 migrant surge.
“Instead of catch-and-release, we need to go to catch-and-deport,” she said.
She also mocked Mr. DeSantis for being a latecomer to the issue, saying he waited five years — until he was eyeing a run for the White House — before pushing for E-Verify in Florida.
Mr. DeSantis countered that Ms. Haley can’t be trusted on immigration, saying her donors are people who “want open borders.”
“That’s like having the fox guard the henhouse,” he said.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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