Alex Padilla U.S. Senator for California

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, U.S. Senator Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Immigration Subcommittee, spoke at Senate Republicans’ subcommittee hearing titled, “ICE Under Fire: The Radical Left’s Crusade Against Immigration Enforcement.” Padilla emphasized that violence against law enforcement is never acceptable, but Republicans’ partisan hearing was an outrageous attempt to deflect from the Administration’s consistent excessive use of force and racial profiling during immigration enforcement actions across the country, while parroting the Administration’s unsubstantiated claims to justify President Trump’s mass deportation agenda.

Without any government witnesses to testify or data to back up the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) claims of a large spike in assaults on its officers and agents, Padilla reiterated that the hearing was “not a serious attempt to protect law enforcement” or conduct oversight. Padilla has submitted requests to DHS for months to back up their statements of a “500%,” “1,000%,” and now “8,000%” increase in assaults and death threats against their agents and officers, but DHS has refused to provide the underlying data.

At the same time, Padilla stressed that while DHS claims to be going after “the worst of the worst” violent criminals, over 70 percent of those currently detained in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody have no criminal record. Yet ICE and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) continue violently abusing their power against individuals, including American citizens and hardworking long-term immigrants, in cities throughout the nation.

Video of Padilla’s remarks before walking out of the hearing can be seen here and can be downloaded here.

Padilla’s full remarks, as delivered, are available below:

Good afternoon, thank you Mr. Chairman.

Let me first say that violence against law enforcement is never okay.

I speak for all my Democratic colleagues on the committee and the Senate for that matter in saying so. Violence against law enforcement is never okay.

And I will continue to emphasize that as we have in the past, we will today, and in the future if for no other reason because many of our colleagues on the other side of the aisle suggest and accuse Democrats of believing otherwise.

But for today’s hearing, let me begin with a very simple question: Why are we here?

Are we here truly to conduct oversight and find ways to actually improve the situation and public safety in our communities? Or are we simply here to throw more fuel on the political fire?

Today’s hearing title tells us all we need to know: “The Radical Left’s Crusade Against Immigration Enforcement.”

That doesn’t exactly set the stage for a productive, serious conversation about how we both protect law enforcement officials and improve public safety.

It’s the title of the next exercise in Republican political theater. That’s really what’s happening here.

So let me once again say that violence against law enforcement is never okay.

But I refuse to sit back as this committee attempts to use or condone the use of law enforcement as a shield for abuses of power by this Administration.

If today’s hearing was indeed a serious effort to protect our law enforcement, we would have government witnesses testifying before us today and fielding our questions as a committee.

But that’s not the case.

If today’s hearing was a serious effort, those government witnesses would be providing facts and data behind the numbers that the Department of Homeland Security so often cites to claim an increase in assaults on its officers and agents.

But even after repeated requests, months and months of request from my office and from others to the Department of Homeland Security to back up their claims of — is it “500%?” Is it “1,000%?” Now we’re even hearing claims of up to “8,000%” increase in assaults or death threats — they have refused to provide them.

Mr. Chairman, you’re very well aware of this. You and I discussed this last week. And as far as I can tell, they’ve even refused your requests for data and statistics.

Why am I insisting on this? Why am I making this point?

Because that data is critical. Not only would it allow us to actually verify their claims, but that data would be critical to informing our policy response.

So no, today’s hearing is not a serious attempt to protect law enforcement.

It’s designed to fuel the propaganda machine and encourage even more brutal immigration enforcement operations.

It’s designed to cover up for the fact that after President Trump pledged to go after the worst of the worst, this we do know from DHS statistics: over 70 percent of those currently detained in ICE custody have no criminal record.

If they were simply focused on those truly dangerous, violent criminals, there would be no objection, there would be no debate, there would be no discussion. But the reality is far from their claims.

At the same time, what we are seeing every day is new acts of brutality and misuse of force in communities across the country.

But my guess is that today, you won’t be hearing about the Department of Homeland Security’s violent take downs of peaceful, hardworking long-term immigrants who don’t have that violent criminal record that the Administration wants you to believe.

And I’m not just making this up. There’s case after case, including a deaf DACA recipient who had his hands cuffed and his phone taken away so he couldn’t communicate as he was shoved into the back of a car.

You won’t hear about the journalists who were threatened and assaulted, one so severely in New York they had to be hospitalized.

You won’t hear about the clergy being shot in the head with a pepper ball or arrested for attempting to administer the sacrament of communion to the faithful at a detention facility.

And you won’t hear about the 170 American citizens — there’s probably more, but that’s what’s been documented — caught up in these chaotic immigration raids. American citizens caught up in these raids.

Even as Secretary Noem lies and … when she says that no American citizens have been detained, every week, we read new reports about another American who’s had their neck kneeled on, their door blown off, or their window smashed, and even a pregnant woman in Florida — a United States citizen — who was thrown to the ground during an arrest, and who later miscarried. This is happening every day across the country.

Masked agents have become so emboldened that even a Reagan-appointed federal judge recently wrote, and I’ll quote: “In all our history we have never tolerated an armed masked secret police … carrying on in this fashion.”

Now, this Administration ignores the fundamental rights to due process every day as it carries out this authoritarian enforcement agenda, and instead has replaced it with the idea that if you look or talk a certain way, that’s enough for you to be detained or even deported before you have a day in court.

That’s not just morally wrong; it’s an attack on our fundamental liberties and the rule of law in the United States of America.

But again, Republicans don’t want to discuss any of this. Why? Out of fear of crossing the President and his outrage machine.

Americans have had enough.

They’re sick of masked agents disrespecting daycares, schools, and churches, disappearing loved ones, and intimidating our communities.

Americans are demanding that we do something.

So, Mr. Chairman, it’s clear to me that this hearing will not be a serious or constructive conversation.

And for that reason, I refuse to give oxygen to the fire of disinformation and propaganda that this hearing was set up to ignite.

And I refuse to be part of this charade.

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