Bob Onder Describes Shocking Crime Committed Against One Of His Constituents To Slam Illegal Immigration

4/11/2025

At Wednesday's House Judiciary Committee hearing, Rep. Bob Onder (R-MO) spoke about illegal immigration and sanctuary cities.

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Transcript

00:00conclude and recognize Mr. Onder. Thank you Mr. Chairman and thank you for all the

00:08witnesses here today. You know less than a week after I was sworn in as a new

00:14member of Congress one of my 18 year old constituents was sexually assaulted on a

00:19lift ride which was driven by an illegal alien who had overstayed his tourist

00:26visa. Five days later this same illegal alien again kidnapped and assaulted

00:33another one of my constituents this time while we're driving an uber. Thankfully

00:38our local St. Charles County Missouri Police Department arrested him two days

00:43later and this violent illegal alien faces multiple felony charges including

00:50second-degree sexual assault and third-degree kidnapping. And while he is

00:55being held on a two hundred fifty thousand dollar bond, ICE could issue a

00:59detainer requesting St. Charles County PD to notify ICE before he's released from

01:05custody so that ICE can take him into custody. And I have no doubt that in St.

01:11Charles County the police department will cooperate. In addition Missouri has a law

01:18which I actually passed in 2008 banning sanctuary jurisdictions and at the same

01:25time requiring local police to cooperate with ICE in enforcement of

01:32our immigration laws. But of course, and that's why we're here today, in other

01:35states and jurisdictions some police departments routinely deny these ICE

01:39detainers returning violent illegal aliens like this rideshare driver back

01:44into our communities. Sanctuary cities are dangerous because they release

01:49really safety threats to our back into our communities. And of course, Tom, our new

01:56immigration star, Tom Holman recognized that he will make fighting this a priority. Mr.

02:02Holman, if a sanctuary city ignores or denies an ICE detainer, does ICE eventually

02:09apprehend the criminal alien? It obviously depends on the situation and obviously ICE has resource

02:17constraints and their ability to comply with, you know, to issue every request and how it works. I

02:22mean, the operational roadblocks that ICE is currently hitting based on the accounts that are

02:29running dry, the money they have in the backfill, they're not even close when it comes to capability at

02:35the moment. So that would be sometimes called an at-large arrest. And why is that more dangerous to

02:43ICE offener officers and to the aliens and to the community than if the jurisdiction simply honored

02:51an ICE detainer? I mean, because they have to go out in the field and conduct a removal effort that

02:56is complex. You're already seeing it too, the other side of groups on the left were out there leaking

03:01pending operations of them going to raid a house because they don't want it to happen when they're

03:06putting them at risk. Every enforcement operation that happens out there is at risk for them. 98%

03:13of illegal aliens are currently Roman free. We can't even track them with a monitoring device

03:16or they're not even in our custody or just, you know, like going out into the abyss and trying to

03:21find these people and putting their lives at risk. It's dangerous. And do these illegal aliens who are

03:27released, do they sometimes reoffend? Oh, of course. Absolutely. I mean, there's,

03:34and then the thing too, it's when it comes to any crime that's committed by an illegal alien is 100%

03:39preventable. We could have prevented every single one. You cannot compare them to US citizen crime

03:45rates. It's impossible. And, you know, proponents of sanctuary jurisdictions sometimes argue that

03:51honoring ICE detainers cooperating with ICE will erode confidence in the community

03:58and the local law enforcement, make people afraid to come forward and report crimes. What say you to

04:05that? Show me one example of it. I want to hear one example of a person that was arrested for reporting

04:13a crime. We have legal immigration pathways that do protect witnesses and things like that. Show me

04:18one example of it. I still have not heard one from any law enforcement officer. Thank you.

04:25And Mr. Chairman, I would, without objection, I'd like to offer in for the record,

04:33three, three studies, one quote, another fatally flawed study on illegal alien crime from the Cato

04:41Institute. Another SCAP data suggest illegal aliens commit crime at a much higher rate

04:47than citizens and lawful immigrants. And a third, Cato Institute's analysis on illegal alien crime,

04:54latest in a long history of poor scholarship. I think there's sometimes this narrative that illegal

05:00aliens are more law abiding than American citizens. And I think that is truly false.

05:05Without objection. Thank you. I yield back.

05:06Mr. Gill.

Bob Onder Describes Shocking Crime Committed Against One Of His Constituents To Slam Illegal Immigration

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