At a press briefing promoting Operation Tidal Wave, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) responded to a reporter slamming his actions on illegal immigration.
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00:00and ready and willing and able to help.
00:02With all due respect, this is the United States of America.
00:06Where are you from?
00:07I'm WSBA, Channel 7.
00:09My name is Vanessa McClure.
00:10Great, thanks.
00:11United States of America.
00:13So many people are being robbed.
00:14There's a process.
00:15This is wonderful, this God and Tony show.
00:18But there's American citizens who are being deported.
00:21They show their birth certificates.
00:23They show their passports.
00:25They show their IDs.
00:26And a lot of the work being done is a little sloppy.
00:29Well, first of all, I'll let ICE handle that accusation that you're making,
00:33that they're deporting American citizens who are showing birth certificates and all that.
00:37I don't believe that that's true, but I'll let them respond to that.
00:40But you seem to have no sympathy.
00:43You seem to have no sympathy for people that have been victimized by illegal aliens.
00:48What about people, you have someone driving drunk and kills American citizens?
00:53What about people that have been deported previously and led in under Biden,
00:57who then commit sexual offenses or commit homicides?
01:01And then we have more victims as a result of the federal government's previous inattention
01:06and unwillingness to enforce the law.
01:09So there are a lot of people that have been harmed by illegal immigration.
01:14There have been people that have been harmed by Trende Aragua gang members
01:19who should not be in this country in the first place.
01:23So let's just be clear.
01:25Who are you fighting for?
01:26We're fighting for the citizens of Florida.
01:29We want them to be able to live in a society that upholds the rule of law.
01:33We want them to be able to live in a state that is safe.
01:37And we have to take action on it.
01:39I'll let them address your accusation.
01:42But the notion that somehow this is America,
01:44therefore we're supposed to have an open border.
01:47We're not supposed to enforce immigration laws.
01:50We're supposed to just sit on our hands when Biden let in seven or eight million people
01:55illegally into the country.
01:56No, that is not responsible.
01:59That is not what our citizens elected us to do.
02:02So we're in this fight.
02:03I think a lot of these narratives that I hear to me just instinctively,
02:08I think they're fake narratives because I've seen it happen so many times.
02:12But I will let folks at ICE respond to your accusation.
02:15Well, the first thing I'll say is that I think the governor's words really stand on their own.
02:21The men and women of ICE are working every single day to protect the communities,
02:25working with state and local officials to do our very best to protect the communities.
02:29After the Biden administration opened our borders,
02:32allowed people to come into this country that should have never came into this country
02:35in the first place, jeopardizing our families and our communities
02:39and putting them in harm's way on a daily basis.
02:42The men and women of ICE are going into those communities
02:45to protect the men and women in these communities
02:47to be able to do the mission that we've been set on
02:51every single day that the president has given us.
02:54What is the court not being a tab?
02:56Of the 349,000 new court cases in 2025 alone,
03:01only 1% are new cases based on alleged criminal activity.
03:06So a lot of these people don't have criminal tasks or background.
03:10So who's being arrested and where is this information on ICE's website?
03:15It's on court documents, but we can't get this information.
03:18And ICE, quite frankly, isn't being very transparent.
03:21Look, I'll stand by the fact that if you're in this country illegally, you are a criminal.
03:26You will be deported.
03:28You will have the opportunity to be able to come back into this country
03:31through the correct immigration processes.
03:33We're working through those every single day.
03:35But our number one goal is to keep the American people safe
03:39from the criminals that are walking in this country
03:41that should have never been let through in the first place.