The Department of Homeland Security lacks operational control of the border, a top official told lawmakers, a significant admission as Republicans accuse the Biden administration of failing to secure the US-Mexico border.
House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mark Green (R-Tenn.) pressed Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz Wednesday on the matter during a field hearing in Pharr, Texas, asking whether the Department of Homeland Security has “operational control of our entire border.”
“No, sir,” Ortiz said.
Operational control is a technical term rooted in federal law that sets a virtually impossible requirement of preventing “all unlawful entries” into the US. Republicans ...