[House Hearing, 119 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
SANCTUARY POLICIES: VICTIMS' PERSPECTIVES
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION INTEGRITY,
SECURITY, AND ENFORCEMENT
COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED NINETEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
TUESDAY, JUNE 30, 2026
__________
Serial No. 119-76
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via: http://judiciary.house.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
64-139 WASHINGTON : 2026
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COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
JIM JORDAN, Ohio, Chair
DARRELL ISSA, California JAMIE RASKIN, Maryland, Ranking
ANDY BIGGS, Arizona Member
TOM McCLINTOCK, California JERROLD NADLER, New York
THOMAS P. TIFFANY, Wisconsin ZOE LOFGREN, California
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
CHIP ROY, Texas HENRY C. ``HANK'' JOHNSON, Jr.,
SCOTT FITZGERALD, Wisconsin Georgia
BEN CLINE, Virginia TED LIEU, California
LANCE GOODEN, Texas PRAMILA JAYAPAL, Washington
JEFFERSON VAN DREW, New Jersey J. LUIS CORREA, California
TROY E. NEHLS, Texas MARY GAY SCANLON, Pennsylvania
BARRY MOORE, Alabama JOE NEGUSE, Colorado
HARRIET M. HAGEMAN, Wyoming LUCY McBATH, Georgia
LAUREL M. LEE, Florida DEBORAH K. ROSS, North Carolina
WESLEY HUNT, Texas BECCA BALINT, Vermont
RUSSELL FRY, South Carolina JESUS G. ``CHUY'' GARCIA, Illinois
KEVIN KILEY, California SYDNEY KAMLAGER-DOVE, California
GLENN GROTHMAN, Wisconsin JARED MOSKOWITZ, Florida
BRAD KNOTT, North Carolina DANIEL S. GOLDMAN, New York
MARK HARRIS, North Carolina JASMINE CROCKETT, Texas
ROBERT F. ONDER, Jr., Missouri SUMMER LEE, Pennsylvania
DEREK SCHMIDT, Kansas
BRANDON GILL, Texas
MICHAEL BAUMGARTNER, Washington
------
SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION INTEGRITY, SECURITY,
AND ENFORCEMENT
TOM McCLINTOCK, California, Chair
ANDY BIGGS, Arizona PRAMILA JAYAPAL, Washington,
TOM TIFFANY, Wisconsin Ranking Member
CHIP ROY, Texas JERROLD NADLER, New York
TROY E. NEHLS, Texas J. LUIS CORREA, California
JEFFERSON VAN DREW, New Jersey MARY GAY SCANLON, Pennsylvania
TROY E. NEHLS, Texas DEBORAH K. ROSS, North Carolina
BARRY MOORE, Alabama JESUS G. ``CHUY'' GARCIA, Illinois
WESLEY HUNT, Texas JASMINE CROCKETT, Texas
RUSSELL FRY, South Carolina ZOE LOFGREN, California
GLENN GROTHMAN, Wisconsin STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
BRAD KNOTT, North Carolina Vacant
ROBERT F. ONDER, Missouri Vacant
DEREK SCHMIDT, Kansas Vacant
BRANDON GILL, Texas
CHRISTOPHER HIXON, Majority Staff Director
ARTHUR EWENCZYK, Minority Staff Director
C O N T E N T S
----------
Tuesday, June 30, 2026
OPENING STATEMENTS
Page
The Honorable Tom McClintock, Chair of the Subcommittee on
Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement from the State
of California.................................................. 1
The Honorable Pramila Jayapal, Ranking Member of the Subcommittee
on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement from the
State of Washington............................................ 3
The Honorable Jim Jordan, Chair of the Committee on the Judiciary
from the State of Ohio......................................... 5
The Honorable Jamie Raskin, Ranking Member of the Committee on
the Judiciary from the State of Maryland....................... 6
WITNESSES
Joe Abraham, Father of victim Katie Abraham
Oral Testimony................................................. 13
Prepared Testimony............................................. 15
Sarah Pierce, Director of Social Policy, Third Way
Oral Testimony................................................. 24
Prepared Testimony............................................. 26
Sheriff Gary W. Redman, Amador County Sheriff's Office
Oral Testimony................................................. 44
Prepared Testimony............................................. 46
Jessica A. Gorman, Mother of victim Sheridan Grace Gorman
Oral Testimony................................................. 49
Prepared Testimony............................................. 53
LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC. SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING
All materials submitted for the record by the Subcommittee on
Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement are listed
below.......................................................... 91
An article entitled, ``Seven in 10 ICE arrests under Trump have
criminal histories,'' Dec. 26, 2025, Washington Examiner,
submitted by the Honorable Tom McClintock, Chair of the
Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and
Enforcement from the State of California, for the record
A joint statement from Americans for Immigrant Justice, Asian
Pacific Institute on Gender-Based Violence, ASISTA Immigration
Assistance, Esperanza United, Human Rights Watch, and Tahirih
Justice Center, Jun, 30, 2026, submitted by the Honorable
Pramila Jayapal, Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on
Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement from the State
of Washington, for the record
SANCTUARY POLICIES: VICTIMS'
PERSPECTIVES
----------
Tuesday, June 30, 2026
House of Representatives
Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security,
and Enforcement
Committee on the Judiciary
Washington, DC
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:41 p.m., in
Room 2141, Rayburn House Office Building, the Hon. Tom
McClintock [Chair of the Subcommittee] presiding.
Members present: Representatives McClintock, Jordan, Biggs,
Tiffany, Roy, Van Drew, Moore, Hunt, Fry, Grothman, Knott,
Onder, Jayapal, Raskin, Nadler, Scanlon, and Ross.
Mr. McClintock. A quorum is present, and the Subcommittee
will come to order. Without objection, the Chair is authorized
to declare a recess at any time. I want to welcome everyone to
today's hearing on the consequences of sanctuary policies. I
would especially like to note the presence of many sheriffs, as
well as Angel Families who are here today to watch these
proceedings.
Without objection, Ms. Miller and Mr. Lawler will be
permitted to participate in today's hearing for the purpose of
introducing witnesses. Hearing none, so ordered. Without
objection, Mr. Baum-gartner will be permitted to participate in
today's hearing for the purpose of questioning the witnesses if
a Member yields him time for that purpose. Without objection,
so ordered.
I will now recognize myself for an opening statement.
During this session, this Subcommittee is focused on so-called
sanctuary laws that put criminal illegal aliens back on the
streets, rather than turning them over to Federal authorities
for deportation as the law requires. The sole effect is not to
impede general immigration enforcement; it is specifically to
prevent deporting criminals.
The toll of death and destruction caused by these policies
is heartbreaking. As the death toll of innocent Americans
continues to mount, Republicans will continue to avail victims'
families the opportunity to describe the catastrophic impact
that these policies have caused them, two of those families
will address this shortly.
One is the mother of Sheridan Gorman. On March 19th this
year, Sheridan Gorman, an 18-year-old freshman at Loyola
University, went to a Chicago park with friends to watch the
Northern Lights. Instead, she was shot by an illegal alien from
Venezuela allowed into this country by the Biden
Administration. Within months of the illegal alien's release at
the border, he was arrested for shoplifting.
Now, he should have been turned over to authorities for
deportation then. Instead, Chicago's sanctuary law released him
back into the community, where he had no legal right to be, and
Sheridan Gorman is dead as a result. A few weeks ago, we heard
from the mother of Stephanie Minter, murdered by an illegal
alien with dozens of prior arrests, each time returned into the
community by Fairfax County officials.
Their excuse was that despite an $83 million annual budget
for the county sheriff, they just didn't have the resources to
pick up the phone and inform ICE that they had custody of an
illegal alien so that alien could be deported. When I asked
them how much it would cost to make a simple phone call to ICE,
and whether Stephanie Minter's life was worth the cost of that
phone call, I got no response.
The murderer's multiple releases were also enabled by a
far-Left prosecutor who crafts sweetheart deals for illegal
aliens so that they can avoid immigration consequences for
their criminality. None of this makes any sense. Last year
these sanctuary jurisdictions refused to honor at least 17,864
ICE detainer requests of illegal aliens accused of committing
other crimes.
Instead, these aliens who had no right to be in this
country were released onto our streets to re-offend at will.
Illinois and California are just two examples of these renegade
jurisdictions. Their refusal to cooperate with Federal
immigration officials terrorized communities, incentivizes
crime, and undermines the rule of law.
In Illinois alone, one State, in just 11 months,
authorities blew off 1,768 ICE detainers, and instead released
these criminals back onto the streets, despite crimes ranging
from weapons offenses, to burglaries, and to homicides.
According to documents obtained by this Committee, the Cook
County Sheriff's Office alone released 408 criminal aliens from
its custody in 2025 instead of honoring active ICE detainers.
The Democrats complain bitterly that we are focused on this
tragedy. Well, I can assure them that the Republican Majority
will continue to expose the human toll of their policies until
they are rectified. I am sure we will re-hear their complaints
that ICE arrests in communities have led to confrontations with
violent demonstrators.
Those arrests that require squads of officers, and that put
both officers and bystanders in danger would not be necessary
if those aliens were turned over to ICE while in the custody of
local-law enforcement. They also tell us that refusing to
cooperate with ICE fosters trust with the illegal alien
population. Well, this begs the obvious question, can legal
residents trust sanctuary jurisdictions to protect them and
their families?
By the way, a U visa is already available to illegal aliens
who are witnesses or victims to crime. Earlier this year the
Judiciary Committee passed a Shut Down Sanctuary Policies Act.
It prohibits sanctuary jurisdictions from restricting
communications with ICE about criminal aliens. It empowers
local authorities in sanctuary jurisdictions to work with
Federal immigration officials.
It forbids local jurisdictions from shielding criminals
from ICE. It restricts certain Federal grant funding to
sanctuary jurisdictions that thwart Federal law, and it
provides a private right of action for the victims of these
sanctuary policies. All that is simple commonsense. We
shouldn't need a bill to force State and local officials to
protect American citizens over dangerous foreign nationals.
Yet, not a single Democrat on this Committee voted for that
legislation. In addition to the grieving families of Sheridan
Gorman and Katie Abraham who are here today, we are also joined
by Sheriff Gary Redman of Amador County, California, from my
district. He is dealing with an epidemic of illegal alien crime
centered on illegal marijuana grows.
Yet, forbidden by State law from cooperating or even
communicating with ICE to protect his citizens from this
scourge. The Shut Down Sanctuary Policies Act would free him
from these constraints. It is inconceivable that such a
reckless and dangerous policy as the so-called sanctuary laws
could be supported by a major political party.
As we will see again today, that is the current position of
the Democratic Socialist Party. Not a fringe element, but the
actual elected representatives of that party. I look forward to
hearing from our witnesses, and I now yield to the Ranking
Member for her opening statement.
Ms. Jayapal. Thank you so much, Mr. Chair. Let me start by
offering my deepest condolences to you, Ms. Gorman, and to you,
Mr. Abraham, for the loss of your children. As a parent myself,
I can think of no greater loss, and I appreciate you being here
to share their stories and their lives with us. Unfortunately,
this hearing is the fourth time in this Committee that we have
had a hearing on sanctuary cities, the fourth time.
There are many other things that we could be doing other
than this. I would have loved to have had some hearings on the
unconstitutionality of the President's Executive Order on
eliminating birthright citizenship. This is something that the
Supreme Court just ruled today in a 63 Majority was
unconstitutional.
Yet this was an Executive Order that caused so much fear
and trauma across the country, we could have been discussing
that, but we haven't. Instead, we have had this series of
hearings that are designed to attack the very trust policies
that research has shown over and over again have actually saved
lives and kept communities safer.
By maintaining the necessary and important division between
the enforcement of Federal civil immigration laws, and the
enforcement of local criminal laws. This division ensures that
people don't fear law enforcement, who try to enforce
immigration law, and that community members will actually come
forward and be witnesses in these prosecutions to report crimes
when they happen.
The Trump Administration however has ignored decades of
research and has done the exact opposite. They have blurred the
lines between immigration enforcement and law enforcement so
much that they essentially no longer exist. They have destroyed
trust in communities, created fear, and even deported witnesses
to important crimes so that then those crimes cannot be
effectively prosecuted.
On top of that, the Trump Administration has diverted over
28,000 officers from their critical law enforcement activities
to work on immigration enforcement instead. This has led to
nonimmigration criminal prosecutions falling to their lowest
point in decades. Gun prosecutions have fallen more than 10
percent. Investigators worked 33 percent fewer hours on child
exploitation cases.
Nearly one in every five FBI agents have been reassigned to
arrest immigrants instead of conducting complex criminal
investigations of corruption, espionage, terrorism,
cyberattacks, and transnational gangs, all things that are
necessary to keep Americans safe. Similarly, around one in
every two Drug Enforcement Agency agents, two in three Bureau
of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives agents, and one
in five U.S. Marshals have all been reassigned to immigration
enforcement.
From within ICE, thousands of Homeland Security
investigations, HSI agents, are focused on immigration
enforcement instead of their stated mission of combating
transnational crimes such as drug and weapons smuggling, child
exploitation, and human trafficking. During the immigration
enforcement surge in Minnesota, Federal prosecutions of gun and
drug offenses dropped by nearly 90 percent--90 percent.
The DHS's former Chief of Staff says that as a result of
all this, our government is quote,
Asleep at the wheel, and less prepared to stop terrorist
attacks than at any point since 9/11.
For what, what are the results of that? Arrests of immigrants
without a single criminal conviction surged by 770 percent.
These immigrants of all immigration statuses get locked up,
or deported, or disappeared at tremendous cost to you, the
taxpayers, and to the traumatized communities that are left
behind. That is not a public safety agenda, that is a public
safety disaster. Let us just remind people about what this
immigration enforcement strategy of this Administration has led
to.
Under Donald Trump, ICE doubled in size. Instead of funding
Americans' healthcare, or housing, or childcare, Republicans
poured over $210 billion, $210 billion into ICE and CBP. The
DHS officers killed two U.S. citizens in cold blood in
Minnesota; have we had a hearing on that? No, we haven't.
They beat and detained countless U.S. citizens for
exercising First Amendment rights and broke down doors without
a warrant in violation of the Fourth Amendment. ICE has
imprisoned 400,000 people just in the interior of this country
since Trump came in. Parents, children, military veterans, U.S.
citizens, people on valid visas, and people who have never
committed a single crime.
The private prison companies who incarcerate these people
get massive profits. They turn around, and then contribute to
Republicans and Trump's campaigns, while maintaining the most
horrific conditions inside the prisons that have led to a
record 51 deaths in ICE Detention just since President Trump
took office. What does all this do for Americans? It hurts
them.
Their communities get torn apart, their kids lose friends,
their businesses suffer from lack of workers, and guess what?
Americans actually lose jobs due to harsh immigration
enforcement. The Brookings Institution looked at increased ICE
enforcement in 86 metro areas in Red and Blue States and found
that up to 297,000 American born workers have lost their jobs
as a result of ICE's increased enforcement.
That all needs to stop. Our hearings should be on how
public safety has been hurt thanks to this Administration's
policies, or on holding people who killed and detained American
citizens accountable. On the numerous times that this
Administration denies due process in violation of our
Constitution. That is what the American people want, not more
of what we are doing today.
More than 60 percent of Americans now disapprove of Donald
Trump's immigration policies. Americans want Trump and
Republicans to focus on lowering grocery prices, stop giving
tax breaks to billionaires while stripping healthcare from tens
of millions of Americans. Just like Trump has insulted
Americans by refusing to sign the most consequential,
bipartisan housing bill in a generation, calling it
unimportant, and a quote ``Yawn.''
He is insulting Americans by continuing these harsh
immigration policies that hurt safety and hurt opportunity for
all Americans. Republicans instead want to coerce States and
localities into doing the Federal Government's job, despite
numerous court orders that have declared immigration detainers
unlawful violations of the Fourth Amendment.
They want to force local police departments to prioritize
their limited resources on immigration enforcement instead of
encouraging all community members to come forward and report
crimes without worrying about theirs or a loved one's
immigration status. I hope that this Committee does hold
hearings on the unconstitutionality of this Administration's
policies.
Certainly, when Republicans are no longer in office after
November, we will do just that in the Majority. I look forward
to hearing from all our witnesses today. I yield back.
Mr. McClintock. Appreciate the warning, the gentlelady
yields back. The Chair is now pleased to recognize the Chair of
the House Judiciary Committee for an opening statement.
Chair Jordan. Thank you, Mr. Chair. We don't want to coerce
anyone; we just want to stop this stupid policy of sanctuary
jurisdiction that led to the tragedy that these families are
going to testify and talk about today. The gentlelady from
Washington, the Ranking Member, said, ``this is the fourth
hearing on sanctuary jurisdictions.''
I will have five, six, seven, or eight, I will have
whatever amount of hearings it takes to stop a policy that is
so ridiculous. Because understand, never forget what sanctuary
jurisdiction is in the simplest of terms, politicians tell
local-law enforcement like Sheriff Redman, don't work with
Federal law enforcement in enforcing Federal law, that is dumb.
It is not only dumb, it results in bad things happening to
families. That is why we are having the fourth hearing, and
like I said, we will do whatever, and my guess is the Chair is
willing to do whatever amount of hearings it takes to get our
legislation across the finish line. Our Sanctuary Jurisdiction
Shutdown Act of 2026.
Understand this as well, it is a systematic--I have said
this every single hearing, all four times, it is a systematic
plan of the Lefts.
Step 1. They let in 10 million illegal migrants during the
Biden Administration, no border, just let in 10 million people.
Step 2. Create sanctuary jurisdictions all over this
country, 18 cities, 11 States, three large counties like
Fairfax County.
Where the prosecutor there gives special deals to migrants
who commit crimes, unequal treatment to Americans frankly. Let
in 10 million, create sanctuary jurisdictions, 18 cities, 11
States, three counties, and the District of Columbia.
Step 3. Don't pay the guys who do the enforcement, don't
pay ICE. They did that for 110 days; they wouldn't fund the
guys who do the enforcement. That is their systematic plan.
Step 4. These crazy prosecutors, soft on crime prosecutors,
who when an illegal migrant commits a crime, they won't work
with Federal law enforcement, let the guy back out, and he does
bad things. Just ask Ms. Gorman, she is going to talk about
that. That is what, again, I just cannot fathom why a party
would embrace that mind set, that approach.
God bless Chair McClintock, he is the sponsor of that bill,
it is a good piece of legislation. We need it to pass the
House, get to the Senate, and get to the President and sign it
so we can stop this nonsense that has led to such tragic
things.
With that, I will yield back, and again, I want to thank
our witnesses for the work, Sheriff, the work you do, the
families who have lost, God bless you, thank you for being
here. It is not easy, I know, but thank you for coming. I know
your Member appreciates it, particularly Ms. Gorman, for you
being here as well.
With that I yield back to the Chair of the Committee.
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman yields back. I now recognize
the Ranking Member of the Full Committee, Mr. Raskin, for his
opening statement.
Mr. Raskin. Well, thank you, Mr. Chair, and thanks to all
our witnesses for being with us today. I especially want to
thank Mr. Abraham and Ms. Gorman for coming to speak about
their beloved daughters who were criminally and savagely stolen
away from their families. As a father, I too know the pain and
devastation of losing a child, and my heart goes out to you and
your families.
Anyone who commits a crime must be held accountable swiftly
and completely. Immigrants, whether lawful or undocumented who
commit violent crimes must be deported at the end of their
criminal sentences. Furthermore, we must end the polarization
and dysfunction in Congress so we can pass comprehensive,
commonsense immigration reform.
We need to make it a whole lot harder for people to enter
the United States unlawfully, and a whole lot easier to enter
the United States legally. Can we agree to an agenda around
that? Yet, instead of working with us on basic, commonsense
reforms to make dreamers lawful residents, to fortify the
border, to expand the categories for admission of lawful
immigrants.
To make sure DHS and ICE are properly focused on following
the law, and pursuing their basic, self-proclaimed mission of
keeping us safe from the worst of the worst, our colleagues are
conducting an endless series of hearings on sanctuary cities.
This is our fourth such hearing. I am not sure Republicans have
even come to any agreement on what they mean when they use that
spooky term.
Last year, Trump's Department of Homeland Security
published a list of nearly 400 counties that it classified as
sanctuary jurisdictions. This caused an uproar with dozens of
conservative sheriffs across the country. Their counties were
named sanctuary jurisdictions simply because they had strong
policies on upholding State's rights.
Rejecting unfunded Federal mandates, and strong policies
against conscripting State and local officers to execute
Federal duties. Stunned by this response, the DHS removed the
list days after it was published.
Because a list of sanctuary jurisdictions defying the Feds
could not possibly include so many conservative sheriffs from
Red counties who drew a strict line around how much of their
locally raised tax revenues and resources, they should have to
spend carrying out the Federal Government's immigration
enforcement agenda, and other constitutional responsibilities
when the Federal Government has a budget far larger than they
do.
Well, this was a telling collision between Republicans and
Republicans. For decades conservatives argued that the Federal
Government could not impose unfunded Federal mandates on
localities, or boss around State and local officials to force
them to do the work of Federal officers charged with enforcing
Federal laws. They even succeeded in the Prince case.
In 1997 to convince a conservative Supreme Court majority
to hold that the Tenth Amendment invalidated a provision in the
Brady Handgun Control Act which purported to compel sheriffs
and police chiefs to conduct background searches on prospective
gun buyers. Just as Antonin Scalia found for the Majority, a
five-four Majority that this provision violated the Tenth
Amendment.
Which prevents the Federal Government he said from
commandeering State and local officers to use their official
time and their local resources to implement unfunded Federal
mandates under the direction of Federal officers. Justice
Scalia asserted that this constitutional prohibition in the
Tenth Amendment was categorical.
He was unmoved by the heartfelt claims that the failure to
integrate local sheriffs and local police into the Federal
machinery of drug policy, of gun policy enforcement would
result in more gun violence, more death, and more injury. ``The
Feds must enforce their own laws,'' Justice Scalia said. This
is precisely the same mistake which I think our friends across
the aisle are making here.
We have heard from some of the jurisdictions dragooned into
Congress on their official time and their official salaries to
participate in this endless sequence of repetitive hearings
that they would notify, and they do notify Federal authorities
of when any immigrant prisoner is set to be released from local
jail.
They arrange for them to be picked up and handed over right
away to immigration authorities. No jurisdiction is giving them
a problem about that. What the ones who have appeared before us
say they cannot do is hold such prisoners beyond the length of
their judicial sentences for the convenience of Federal
officials.
Both because this practice turns State and local officials
into de facto Federal workers, as Justice Scalia said you can't
do, ``reporting to ICE or the Department of Homeland Security
instead of reporting to their own courts.'' Also, because they
say, and certainly the people from Virginia who showed up at
the last hearing said, ``they have no constitutional authority
under due process or habeas corpus law to hold prisoners
without arrest prosecution and conviction.''
The position they have taken, which doesn't seem at least
to be unreasonable or deranged, is simply they are very happy
to work with the Feds to turn people over before their
sentences are completed, but after their sentences are
completed, they can't hold them. Why are our colleagues so
desperate to keep pulling this boogeyman of the sanctuary
jurisdictions out of the closet?
Well, perhaps it has to do with the fact that they voted to
give the DHS more than a quarter of a trillion dollars to
improve immigration enforcement. America has watched as the
Department of Homeland Security has used this staggering pile
of money to waste on luxurious private jets for the Secretary,
complete with bedrooms and bars.
On overpriced and ultimately useless industrial warehouses
to detain human beings that are now being sold off at a massive
loss to the taxpayers. On a glitzy $220 million public
relations horseback photoshoot and ad campaign for a glamorous
Department of Homeland Security Secretary who called the slain
citizens Alex Pretti and Renee Good ``terrorists.''
MAGA Republicans have done nothing as ICE has abused
hundreds of billions of dollars to arrest, beat up, shoot, and
even kill American citizens for exercising their First and
Second Amendment rights. They have allowed ICE to ignore its
duty to keep us safe from the worst of the worst and instead go
after kids and parents coming home from kindergarten.
Rape survivors who just finished testifying in court, and
volunteers at Catholic church soup kitchens. ICE's
indiscriminate and chaotic immigration enforcement has also
undermined the ability of State and local prosecutors and law
enforcement to keep their own communities safe, and to deliver
justice to victims of crime. They are deporting crime victims,
as well as key witnesses and informants without any notice to
State or local police and prosecutors.
As a result, investigations are being thwarted, criminal
trials are being thrown into disarray, and American communities
are less safe. House Judiciary Democrats put out a report
called, ``Acquittal by Removal: How Trump's Mass Deportation
Agenda Abandons Crime Victims and Allows Perpetrators to Avoid
Justice,'' which I recommend that all of you check out.
Not only is the DHS not making our Communities safer, but
it is making us worse off. A recent study found that the metro
areas most targeted by ICE in both Red and Blue States had
suffered losses of nearly 670,000 jobs, up to 44 percent of
which were held by American citizens. The immigration roundup
is profoundly costly to our communities.
The Administration's attacks on so called sanctuary
jurisdictions are hurting Americans from all walks of life. One
can only regard with amazement the fact that rather than own up
to this disastrous record, my colleagues are trying to change
the subject and blame the failures of the Department of
Homeland Security not on Kristi Noem and her dysfunctional
accomplices and successors.
On the State and local jurisdictions, which did not create
the problem, have no real power to address it, and are
constitutionally protected from being impressed into service as
Justice Scalia said, ``by an illegal commandeering policy
passed by Congress.'' The DHS has a quarter of a million
employees, and a budget larger than that of 150 countries on
earth.
It has over 80,000 sworn law enforcement officers, more
than the number of officers in New York, Chicago, L.A.,
Houston, D.C., Las Vegas, and Dallas combined. Despite all
that, our colleagues think that State and local jurisdictions
should be using their money, and their funds to do the
Department of Homeland Security's job for them.
If our colleagues are serious about public safety, they
should join us in imposing guardrails on ICE to refocus their
energy on going after the worst of the worst, and to ensure
that they respect the fundamental rights of every U.S. citizen.
They should reinvest in public safety programs that the
Administration has cut that supported local-law enforcement,
assisted victims of crime, and gone after organized crime and
drug traffickers.
They should push back on the President's shocking abuse of
the pardon power, which has allowed drug traffickers and
international narco-dealers, and criminal fraudsters to walk
free, depriving victims and taxpayers of nearly $2 billion in
unmet restitution. Last Congress we came together to craft a
bipartisan border security bill.
President Biden agreed to sign it, but then candidate Trump
blew up the deal because he wanted a crisis to run on more than
he wanted an actual solution. Sadly, since then our colleagues
have been doing more of the same, holding hearing after hearing
on the same topic, failing to pass their signature border bill,
or even their bill to coerce and commandeer sanctuary cities to
do their bidding.
I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today, and
hope that we can rejoin together in doing the work of the
American people. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. McClintock. Without objection, all other opening
statements will be included in the record, and we will now
introduce today's witnesses.
By the way, I will note that permitting Committee Members
is not something our Committee normally allows, I would ask the
Members to please focus their remarks on introducing the
witness, and refrain from making a broader speech on the topic
of today's hearing.
I will begin by recognizing Ms. Miller to introduce Mr.
Abraham.
Ms. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I am honored to introduce
my friend and fellow Illinois resident, Joe Abraham. One year
ago, Mr. Abraham sat in the House Oversight Committee hearing
as Illinois Governor JB Pritzker defended his Administration
sanctuary policies. I had the opportunity to address that
Committee and question the Governor.
I will never forget seeing Mr. Abraham in the room, a
grieving father seeking answers after losing his daughter to a
tragedy that was entirely preventable. As he will share with
this Committee, the Illinois Governor's refusal to enforce our
Nation's immigration laws contributed to the death of his
youngest child.
Katie Abraham, who has been described by her father as
having a beautiful soul and a large personality, was killed in
the early hours of January 19, 2025, by an intoxicated illegal
alien who crashed into the car carrying Katie and her friends.
Despite unimaginable grief, Joe Abraham chose courage over
silence.
He has become a powerful advocate, not just for Katie, but
for families across America who believe their voices are being
ignored, and for the victims whose stories deserve to be heard,
and for Americans who expect their government to fulfill the
most fundamental responsibility to protect its own citizens.
You could not have picked a better witness, Mr. Chair.
Joe will provide this Committee with a firsthand account of
the consequences of the Left's sanctuary policies, and why we
must never forget its victims. Mr. Chair, thank you.
Mr. McClintock. The gentlelady yields back. I now recognize
Mr. Lawler to introduce Ms. Gorman.
Mr. Lawler. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you for having
me at this important hearing. I am here today to introduce
Jessica Gorman. Jessica should not be here today. She should
not be testifying before Congress. She should be back in New
York with her daughters Madelon and Sheridan, enjoying a quiet
Tuesday afternoon in the summer.
Unfortunately, Jessica is here with us today, and she is
here because just a few short months ago her beautiful daughter
Sheridan was shot and killed in Chicago by an illegal
immigrant. I cannot say it loud enough or clear enough, but
this Nation, and this Congress owes you an apology. We are
sorry to you, to Tom, and to Madelon.
I didn't know Sheridan personally, and that is a tragedy,
but I know her family, and I know the Yorktown community. I
know that she was a kind and compassionate young woman who
cared about her community and had a bright future ahead of us.
I know without a doubt in my mind the incredible things she
would have done with her life, should she had been given the
chance.
Her murder was senseless; it should not have happened. Our
immigration policies exist for a reason, and they should have
been enforced. Sheridan would still be with us today, and
Jessica would not have to testify before this panel. Our
immigration laws facilitate legal immigration processes to
ensure that good, smart people can come into this country,
assimilate, and contribute to our communities.
While also ensuring that criminals who break the law do not
get to stay. Their jobs are made infinitely harder when places
like New York and Chicago blatantly disregard existing law and
provide safe harbor to criminals. Sanctuary policies are the
reason why--
Ms. Jayapal. Mr. Chair, point of order, this is a
statement, not an introduction.
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman will suspend; the
gentlelady's point is well taken. The gentleman will please
confine his remarks to the introduction.
Ms. Jayapal. Thank you.
Mr. Lawler. Back in May 2023, over three years ago,
Sheridan's murderer illegally entered the United States. Border
Patrol caught him, they apprehended him. Then because of the
Biden Administration's ludicrous open border policies, he was
released into our country. A month later he was arrested for
shoplifting in Chicago.
Under existing law, and the law at the time, he should have
been deported right then and there. If Chicago were abiding by
our Federal laws--
Mr. Nadler. Point of order, this is not an introduction, it
is a speech.
Mr. Lawler. You all should be ashamed of yourselves, you
should be ashamed of yourselves, this is disgraceful--
Ms. Jayapal. Mr. Chair, we had--
Mr. Nadler. We ask for a ruling on the point of order--
Mr. Lawler. Precisely because you have failed to do your
jobs--
Ms. Jayapal. Mr. Chair--
Mr. Nadler. We ask for a ruling--
Mr. Lawler. You wonder why we had four hearings--
Mr. McClintock. Everybody settle down.
Mr. Lawler. It is because you don't understand the
consequence of sanctuary policies--
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman will suspend; the gentleman
will suspend--
Ms. Jayapal. Mr. Chair, unfortunately we won't give our
approval for people to introduce their constituents if people
don't stick to the rules. I appreciate the Chair's insistence
that we stick to the rules, and that you have the opportunity
to introduce your constituent, which I think you have done--
Mr. Lawler. Right, introducing my constituent is--
Ms. Jayapal. Thank you very much, Mr. Lawler, and Mr.
Chair, please have the Committee be in order--
Mr. Lawler. Sharing the details of her death, you may not
want to hear the details, it may be an inconvenience to you,
but these details matter.
Ms. Jayapal. Mr. Chair?
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman will suspend. We have an
agreement with the Minority that the introductions will be
introductory only, so if I could just ask for the gentleman to
make that introduction and conclude?
Mr. Lawler. Sure. When you send your kid to college, you
should be worried about making sure they go to class, or
hopefully that they have a nice roommate, or how to help them
get a summer internship, not worried that illegal immigrants
are shooting them while they are out with their friends looking
at the Northern Lights. It is shameful that we are here.
Not because this is the fourth hearing, but because we need
to have four hearings to make people understand the real-life
consequences of the disastrous sanctuary city policies. While
some of my colleagues may not want to hear the truth, the same
outrage you feel about Renee Good and Alex Pretti, you should
feel about Sheridan Gorman--
Ms. Jayapal. Mr. Chair, would you please end this?
Mr. Lawler. Laken Riley, and every Angel Family in this
country--
Ms. Jayapal. End this statement, unfortunately--
Mr. Raskin. I do feel that outrage--
Mr. Lawler. You do not, because if you did, you would not
support sanctuary jurisdictions--
Mr. Raskin. Do you feel the outrage about Alex Pretti and
Renee Good--
Mr. Lawler. You should be ashamed of yourself--
Mr. Raskin. You should be ashamed--
Mr. Lawler. You should be ashamed of yourself, Jamie--
Mr. Raskin. You don't belong on this Committee; you should
get the hell out of here--
Mr. Lawler. You are a disgrace--
Mr. Raskin. You don't understand the rules of the
Committee, you don't understand the Constitution--
Mr. Lawler. You are a disgrace; you are a disgrace--
Mr. Raskin. You are full of it; you are absolutely full of
it--
Mr. McClintock. Mr. Raskin, Mr. Raskin--
Mr. Lawler. You are an absolute disgrace supporting
sanctuary policies--
Mr. McClintock. Mr. Raskin, get ahold of yourself--
Mr. Raskin. Say one word about Alex Pretti--
Mr. Lawler. Get rid of sanctuary policies--
Mr. Raskin. Renee Good--
Mr. McClintock. Mr. Lawler, please suspend--
Mr. Lawler. I did, I wrote a whole The New York Times op ed
about it, you should be absolutely ashamed of yourself for
not--
Mr. Raskin. OK, then follow the rules of the Committee--
Mr. McClintock. The Committee will be--
Ms. Jayapal. Mr. Chair--
Mr. McClintock. The Committee will be--
Mr. Lawler. Opposing sanctuary policies that resulted in
their daughter's death.
Mr. McClintock. The Committee will be in order; we are
going to--
Ms. Jayapal. Mr. Chair, I just want to say we will not
allow, thanks to Mr. Lawler's outrageous outburst, we will not
allow this to happen again. This was an agreement between--
Mr. McClintock. We will proceed--
Ms. Jayapal. The Chair and the Ranking Member, and
unfortunately you are not able to control your Members--
Mr. McClintock. We will proceed--
Ms. Jayapal. It is time for us to proceed.
Mr. Lawler. Your opening statement was outrageous; you
should be ashamed of yourself--
Mr. McClintock. We will proceed; we will proceed in order--
Ms. Jayapal. You are not on the Committee, Mr. Lawler--
Mr. Lawler. I yield back.
Ms. Jayapal. Get off of it.
Mr. McClintock. Let us try to conduct ourselves in a civil
manner.
Ms. Jayapal. Speak that to your Member, Mr. Chair.
Mr. McClintock. We have two other introductions to make,
which I think will go a little more smoothly. One is Ms. Sarah
Pierce, who is the Director of Social Policy at Third Way. She
previously worked at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services,
and has served as Senior Counsel for the Senate Committee on
Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.
Ms. Pierce has a bachelor's degree from Grinnell College, a
master's degree from the Elliott School of International
Affairs, and a law degree from the University of Iowa College
of Law. Finally, we have Sheriff Gary Redman, who has been the
Sheriff of Amador County, California, since 2021. He is a
veteran of the U.S. Air Force.
Sheriff Redman's career includes service with the Los
Angeles Police Department, and nearly three decades with the
Amador County Sheriff's Office. He is a graduate of the Sherman
Block Supervisory Leadership Institute, and the Federal Bureau
of Investigation's National Academy held in Quantico, Virginia.
On a personal note, I will add that Sheriff Redman has been
a leading advocate in California to sound the alarm over
California's sanctuary laws. As we will hear, Sheriff Redman
and many of his fellow sheriffs want desperately to cooperate
and coordinate with ICE, but are forbidden from doing so by
State law.
With those introductions, we will now welcome our
witnesses, thank them for appearing today, and we will begin by
swearing you in.
Would you please rise and raise your right hand? Do you
swear or affirm under penalty of perjury that the testimony you
are about to give is true and correct to the best of your
knowledge, information, and belief, so help you God? Let the
record reflect the witnesses have answered in the affirmative,
please be seated.
Please know that your written testimony will be entered
into the record in its entirety. Accordingly, we ask that you
summarize your testimony in five minutes.
We will begin with Mr. Abraham.
STATEMENT OF JOE ABRAHAM
Mr. Abraham. Chair, Ranking Members, and the Members of the
Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify. For most
Americans January 19, 2025, was just an ordinary day. For my
family it was the day that our lives were permanently altered.
That night my 20-year-old daughter Katie was riding with
friends in Urbana, Illinois, visiting University of Illinois,
friends going to that college.
The vehicle was stopped at a red light, they were exactly
where they were supposed to be, they were obeying laws and
posed a danger to no one. In a matter of seconds, an
intoxicated illegal immigrant driving nearly 80 miles an hour
crashed into the back of their idle vehicle. Katie was killed,
another young woman was killed, three other young people
suffered serious injuries.
My daughter's future ended in that intersection. Katie was
bright, compassionate, athletic, and deeply loved. Today,
instead of watching her graduate from college this year, begin
a career, build a family of her own, we visit and tend to her
grave.
The individual responsible, Julio Cucul-Bol, a Guatemalan
national who was previously deported, and re-entered illegally
in the United States in 2022.
After the crash, he fled, leaving the death and destruction
behind him, but was later apprehended in Texas. As devastating
as Katie's death is, what brings me here before Congress is not
what happened that night. It is everything that happened before
it. Previously deported individual, illegally returned to the
United States, remained here, obtained an Illinois driver's
license, and ultimately killed two women.
Those are not my opinions, those are facts. During court
proceedings, Bol testified through an interpreter that he could
not read, write, or speak English or Spanish. He communicated
primarily with K,iche,, an indigenous Mayan Guatemalan
language. Imagine the struggles of translators there. Yet, he
was issued a valid Illinois driver's license, which raises
serious questions.
How was competency evaluated? Whether public safety was
even a concern, any protocols followed. Accountability cannot
change what happened to Katie, but it can help prevent similar
tragedies. My parents came to America legally more than 60
years ago from a developing country. Like millions of lawful
immigrants, they believed America was a Nation governed by laws
rather than political convenience.
They respected the process because they respected the
country. They taught me citizenship carries obligations, that
laws exist for a reason, and that government has fundamental
responsibilities to the people it serves. When government fails
in that responsibility, real people bear the consequences, my
daughter was one of them.
The central question before this Committee to me is
straight forward. Did failures in immigration enforcement,
government coordination, public policy increase preventable
risks to American citizens? These are not partisan questions,
they are oversight questions, they are public safety questions.
Too often immigration debates become about systems and
policies, while victims fade into the background.
Katie was not a statistic; she was my daughter. She should
still be alive today. Congress can't undo what happened to
Katie, but it can examine what failed, demand transparency from
government agencies and public officials, insist that policies
be judged not by their intentions, by their outcomes. Katie
lost her future January 19, 2025, my family lost ours with her.
I ask this Committee to demand full transparency, identify
the failures that allowed a previously deported individual to
illegally return, remain in this country, obtain a driver's
license, and ultimately kill two young women. Hold government
accountable, strengthen coordination between Federal, State,
and local authorities, and judge every policy by one simple
question. Would this better protect the next American stopped
at a red light? Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Abraham follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. McClintock. Thank you for your testimony. We will next
hear from Ms. Pierce.
STATEMENT OF SARAH PIERCE
Ms. Pierce. Chair McClintock, Ranking Member Jayapal, thank
you for the opportunity to speak today. I would like to start
by saying Mr. Abraham and Ms. Gorman, I am incredibly sorry for
your losses, no one should suffer like your families have
suffered, and I honor and admire your bravery in being here
today. My name is Sarah Pierce; I am the Director of Social
Policy at Third Way.
Third Way has a long history of saying things that both
Democrats and Republicans dislike, so let me start there. The
Biden Administration's border policies were inexcusable. The
Trump Administration's interior enforcement policies are also
inexcusable. My testimony today focuses on why; I have three
main points.
First, sanctuary policies do not prevent ICE from enforcing
Federal law. Every jurisdiction, including self-proclaimed
sanctuaries, participates in immigration enforcement. When
someone is booked, fingerprints are checked against Federal
databases, and ICE has access to that. ICE has Federal
authority, agents, databases, and now extraordinary funding,
$113.5 billion in supplemental funding through 2029.
This is more than the combined operating budgets of every
local-law enforcement jurisdiction in America. Meanwhile, State
and local-law enforcement are starved for resources. Three
quarters of local police departments have fewer than 25
officers. They handle crime, overdoses, sensitive community
calls, asking them to absorb Federal duties, pulls them away
from their local obligations.
The focus should be on how cooperation can advance public
safety and support local policing.
Second, this Administration is making cooperation harder,
not easier. Local jurisdictions need to trust Federal partners
before they lend them local resources. Yet, this Administration
has treated skeptical jurisdictions as adversaries to be
punished, not partners to be persuaded.
This Administration has threatened funding, filed lawsuits,
and accused entire jurisdictions of protecting criminals. ICE's
tactics have deepened this trust deficit. The public cannot
distinguish between police and ICE, especially when ICE is
wearing police markings. When Federal operations are chaotic,
abusive, or deadly, local police are left to repair the damage.
Third, this Administration's own decisions are making
Americans more vulnerable to crime. Federal law enforcement are
abandoning serious work in favor of immigration enforcement. In
San Francisco, Federal drug dealing prosecutions fell by more
than half after Federal agents were redirected to immigration
enforcement.
In Minnesota, Hennepin County's top prosecutor said Federal
agents were bringing criminal cases to her because they were
too busy with immigration work. In addition, tens of thousands
of Federal agents with specialized experience in child
exploitation, human trafficking, arms trafficking, and violent
crime have been diverted from their primary public safety
missions to instead focus on immigration enforcement.
That is especially dangerous for child exploitation cases,
which require specialized resources and personnel. When those
agents get reassigned, children wait longer to be found, and
predators get more time to harm them. The Department of Justice
is also weakening public safety infrastructure by delaying and
canceling grants.
Each year the Department of Justice grants billions for
police hiring, prosecutors, and victim services across the
United States. Congress provided more than $4.5 billion for the
Fiscal Year 2025 grants from the Department of Justice's Office
of Justice Programs, but now nine months later less than half
of that has gone out the door.
Notably for the Majority on this Committee, the States you
represent are missing $163 million in congressionally
authorized public safety funding from last year. That money
still has not gone out to Alabama, Arizona, California, Kansas,
Missouri, New Jersey, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas,
and Wisconsin. The Administration has also terminated more than
$820 million in public safety grants.
Cutting initiatives on rural crime, officer safety and
wellness, anti-terrorism training, and more than half of
Federal gun violence prevention funding. For grants that are
going out, new ideological conditions related to political
priorities like vaccines, gender ideology, and protection of
public monuments are discouraging applicants from even
applying.
I urge this Subcommittee to broaden its oversight and stop
treating sanctuary fights as a substitute for all public safety
oversight. Demand a course correction, restore the grants to
your own States. Stop diverting specialized agents from serious
crime and rebuild trust that local-law enforcement need. Thank
you, and I look forward to your questions.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Pierce follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. McClintock. Thank you for your testimony. We will next
hear from Sheriff Redman.
STATEMENT OF SHERIFF GARY W. REDMAN
Sheriff Redman. Distinguished Members of the Committee,
today I would like to share my perspective on the impacts
illegal immigration has had on a small, rural county such as
Amador. Located in California's Gold Country East of
Sacramento, Amador covers 594 square miles, and is served by
just 54 sworn deputies, and approximately 40 correctional
deputies.
Providing public safety services across such a large
geographic area presents unique challenges. From 1999-2015 I
served eight years as a SWAT operator, and another eight years
as a SWAT team leader responsible for high-risk search warrants
and tactical operations. During that time, many large scale,
illegal marijuana cultivation operations in Amador and
neighboring counties were controlled by the Mexican drug
cartels.
These organizations frequently utilized individuals who had
been smuggled into the United States to work at
cultivationsites. Many of these individuals were armed, and on
occasion have engaged law enforcement officers. These
operations pose significant risks not only to law enforcement
personnel, but also the public.
Amador attracts more than 20,000 visitors annually to its
streams, rivers, lakes, hiking trails, and campgrounds. Hikers
and outdoor enthusiasts have encountered illegal
cultivationsites and armed individuals. Cartels also smuggled
banned pesticides into the region, causing substantial
environmental damage, and harming local wildlife.
Between 2015-2025, Amador County investigated 73 illegal
marijuana cultivation operations involving individuals believed
to be unlawfully present in the United States. Arrests or
charges resulting from those investigations include 173
individuals' Asian origin, persons from China, Thailand,
Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, 53 Mexican nationals, one Venezuelan
national, two Ukrainian nationals, two South African nationals,
and one Guatemalan national.
Since President Trump returned to office, and Federal
immigration enforcement priorities have changed, we have
cooperated with ICE to the fullest extent permitted under
California's SB 54 sanctuary law. As sheriff, my highest
priority is protecting public safety. In early 2025, I made the
decision that I would not knowingly release an undocumented
criminal offender who posed a significant public safety risk
back into the community.
Even if doing so placed me at odds with SB 54. On September
2, 2024, my office received a report involving a 14-year-old
girl who disclosed to her cousin that her uncle, Diaz Mendoza,
age 48, had been touching her over her clothing in the vaginal
area. A deputy responded to the lake where she was present,
interviewed the visibly distraught victim.
She reported the abuse had been occurring for approximately
five months outside of Amador County. My deputy interviewed the
suspect and established probable cause to arrest him for felony
lewd acts involving a minor. Two days later the suspect
appeared in court and was released by the judge.
In 2025, I was informed by our probation department that
Diaz Mendoza had entered into a plea agreement negotiated by an
Amador County Deputy District Attorney. The agreement reduced
the case to a misdemeanor offense with credit time served, and
suspended probation sentence. I was advised that the plea
agreement was structured at least in part because of my
publicly stated position regarding cooperation with ICE, and
the likelihood that ICE would be notified on his release.
On learning of the plea agreement, I immediately contacted
ICE and requested the agents take him into custody on his
release from court. Due to the limited notice, ICE was unable
to respond that day. However, agents did locate and arrest him
approximately two weeks later. We subsequently informed the
victim and her mother, both of whom expressed appreciation for
our efforts, and relief that he would no longer have access to
this 14-year-old victim.
Since 2025, I have contacted ICE eight times regarding
removals authorized under SB 54 within my jail. Additionally,
under SB 54, I have been required to release 16 individuals
arrested for low-level offenses that did not meet the
requirements of SB 54. My greatest concern as sheriff is that
one of these individuals may re-offend, and cause another
preventable tragedy such as Laken Riley, and the people that
are here with me to my right and my left.
Preventable. In my view, public policies should prioritize
accountability for criminal offenders, protection for victims,
and the safety of law-abiding citizens. I believe it is long-
overdue that we place greater emphasis on victims' rights, hold
offenders accountable, and ensure that public safety remains
our highest priority. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Sheriff Redman follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. McClintock. Thank you for your testimony, sheriff.
Finally, we will hear from Ms. Gorman.
STATEMENT OF JESSICA A. GORMAN
Ms. Gorman. Hi, my name is Jessica Gorman, I am--
Mr. McClintock. Can you turn on your microphone?
Ms. Gorman. Hi, my name is Sheridan Gorman--I am sorry. My
name is Jessica Gorman; I am the mother of Sheridan Grace
Gorman. Sheridan was 18 years old, she was a freshman at Loyola
University Chicago, she was beautiful, she was funny, faithful,
loving, and full of plans to build something with her life. On
March 19th Sheridan went with friends to the lake front in
Chicago, because they hoped they might see the Northern Lights.
She never saw those lights. The man accused of murdering my
daughter is Jose Medina, an illegal immigrant from Venezuela,
who should not have even been in this country. Even after
committing a crime and having an outstanding warrant, he was
left on the streets of Chicago to murder my innocent, American
child.
This story is not about him, this story is about my
Sheridan. It is about how failed border policies, sanctuary
city laws, and twisted leaders refuse to cooperate with ICE,
they sent her to her grave. It is about a government and
politicians that forgot their first priority, and the question
before this Committee is painfully simple. When did protecting
our American citizens, stop being your first priority?
Even more important, why did protecting our American
citizens stop being your first priority? I want an explanation,
I need one, and I deserve one, but first I want you to know who
my Sheridan was. I want you to understand what we all lost
because of your mismatched priorities. My husband and I have
always joked that our older daughter Madelon is our pride,
while Sheridan was our joy.
From the moment she was born, Sheridan had pure energy,
enthusiasm, laughter, and fun. She was the kind of person who
made every room brighter, and usually a little louder. Which is
why when Sheridan was in kindergarten, I remember going to her
first parent teacher conference, I was a little nervous.
Because while she was the sweetest little girl you could
possibly imagine, she was also the chattiest.
I remember sitting down across from her teacher bracing
myself, and asking with bated breath, how is my Sheridan? I
will never forget when the teacher looked at me very seriously
and said I only have one thing to say to you, my stomach
dropped. Then she said, ``Your Sheridan stalks the buddy
bench.'' I remember blinking at her, ``I am sorry, what?'' She
said, ``Your Sheridan stalks the buddy bench.''
I was totally confused, and I asked is that a good thing,
or is that a bad thing? What exactly is a buddy bench? The
teacher smiled and said it is a beautiful thing. She explained
that they had a bench in the play yard, she said that not all
kids are as outgoing and confident as your Sheridan, so the
children were told that if they wanted to play, or if they felt
lonely, left out, shy, they could sit on that bench.
Then the other children were told that if they saw someone
sitting there, they should go over, talk to them, and ask them
to play. Apparently Sheridan, my tiny kindergartner, had
appointed herself the guardian of that bench. Every day at
recess, instead of heading straight to the swings or joining in
a game of kick ball, my daughter hung back, and hovered by the
nearby tree, just watching that bench, just waiting, just in
case someone might need her.
Kids didn't even have a chance to fully sit down on the
bench before Sheridan was rushing over to take their hand, pull
them away, girls, boys, first graders, and kindergartners, it
really didn't matter to her. If a child looked lonely, Sheridan
went over. If someone had no one to play with, Sheridan was
there. If someone felt invisible, Sheridan saw them.
That was my daughter, and that is who she was until the day
she was stolen from us. I honestly can't make sense of it. I
cannot make peace with it. What world does the child who makes
sure no one was lonely die terrified and alone on a pier in
Chicago? In what world does the girl who saw everyone become
invisible to the people in power responsible for protecting
her?
This cannot be explained away, and it cannot be buried
beneath the list of unrelated issues that you all paraded
before us, thanks for telling me without telling me that you
are here, but you don't want to be. This is the fourth time you
had Angel Families, thanks for telling me you don't care. This
cannot be buried under your slogans, your statistics, or
excuses, and this just can't stand.
Today, I bring this back to the buddy bench. I think
Congress needs one. Every Governor, every mayor, every
sanctuary city official and politician, shifting blame and
interest, hiding behind their slogans and talking points should
have to all sit on one. I challenge you all to sit down with
me, take my hand, look me in the eye, and then explain to me,
because I just don't understand.
Explain why people here illegally matter more than your
American citizens. Explain why sanctuary policies matter more
than my Sheridan's life. Explain why cooperation with ICE was
too much to ask for. Asking our American parents to bury our
children is somehow acceptable. Ask me, I need you to tell me.
I want you to imagine that this little girl on the buddy
bench, that innocent college freshman with a heart full of
compassion and a head full of dreams that was gunned down by an
illegal immigrant, I want you to imagine that was your
daughter, not mine. What if she was yours, would you even
hesitate for 1 second to act, or to make changes? My Sheridan
spent her whole life choosing others.
Today, I am just asking this Committee, our Congress, and
our country to choose her. She was worth protecting, she was
worth saving, she was worth your brave vote. To all those who
have supported us, who have prayed for us, who have cried with
us, and to those that have had the courage to speak out, and
say Sheridan's name, thank you. Because every time you say her
name you give a piece of her back to us.
You remind the world that Sheridan was not a talking point,
she wasn't a statistic or a headline, she was our daughter. She
will always be my sweet sunshine. If the people who failed her
would rather look away, then I am asking the rest of you to
look right at her, here she is, there is she and I, here she
is, this is taken then day before she died.
Say her name, tell her story, and demand better, because my
Sheridan Grace Gorman should still be alive. No mother should
have to stand where I am standing, begging, begging, elected
leaders to value my child's life after it is already too late.
I cried when I came into the room, I saw this poster that you
made, it said ``at every stop the system had a chance to stop
him, at every step it failed.''
My daughter paid for those failures, your failures with her
life. No family should ever have to bury a child because public
officials failed to put American lives first. I am just asking
you to choose us, we choose you, we choose you, choose us. Why
does my child matter less than an illegal immigrant, why?
Listen, I have a heart, I love immigrants, two of my best
friends in this whole world are immigrants, they came here the
right way.
I absolutely think they make America beautiful, but my
daughter is beautiful too. I need you to think about what these
policies are, and I need you to imagine this is your daughter,
because I am very sure you won't be cutting off anyone when
they are speaking, I would be very sure you won't call this a
political stunt, the grief is real. Every day I wake up with
unimaginable pain.
Do you know what, I wake up in the middle of the night, and
I think did my daughter cry for me? She made it forty feet, she
made it forty feet running for her life, did she cry out for
me? She died on that pavement all by herself, lonely, bleeding
on that pavement, and I will never, ever rest, I actually have
to say that I am devastated, my husband and I, we are only a
couple years away from retirement, I have worked my whole life
so hard.
All I wanted to do was just enjoy our children, I just
wanted to enjoy my Sheridan, my Madelon, and now I am bitter. I
am bitter because I am a lover, not a fighter, I am a lover, I
love children, I love pumping people up and making them feel
good about themselves. I am not racist, I am not xenophobic, we
have done everything right, my husband and I, we taught our
daughter to be a wonderful, beautiful person, her love was
extravagant.
Now, I am going to have to spend my last waking moment, I
am going to have to spend fighting, fighting against these
policies, and fighting for people to say her name. If you have
the courage, please come talk to me, come sit on that bench, I
will buy Congress a bench. Talk to each other, we shouldn't be
screaming across the room. I mean we also shouldn't say
``but,'' because I have to just say, and I understand that you
are here for a reason.
I don't understand why it is only the Republican side that
cares about our American children. I know that you are a
mother, I know that you are a father, I deeply value that, but
basically what you just did, what you said was I am so sorry
for your loss, I have a daughter too, I have a son, I feel your
pain, you don't, you don't feel my pain. Because the next words
out of your mouth were ``but.''
There is no but when your child is in the coffin, there is
no but. I need you to understand that, and if you ever want to
talk about it, I am here, I am going to buy you a bench. I am
going to buy, you can put that on the record, I am going to buy
Congress the bench, and they can come, and sit, and hold my
hand, and look me in the eye, and explain to me why illegal
immigrants are more important than my daughter.
I really want to know, because I don't understand. Please,
I welcome you, I will listen, I will listen, I care, I care, I
just need you to explain it to me, because I don't, and I fear
I will never understand. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Gorman follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. McClintock. Thank you for your testimony, I can't
imagine how difficult this appearance is for you, and we thank
you for being here today. We will now proceed under the five-
minute rule of questions.
We will begin with Mr. Tiffany.
Mr. Tiffany. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Mr. Abraham
and Ms. Gorman, for being here. We are proud to cite the names
of Sheridan and Katie here before this Judiciary Committee
hearing. Ms. Gorman, would you say you, your neighbors, and
your community are safer when a government protects violent
criminals and illegal aliens over Americans?
Ms. Gorman. No.
Mr. Tiffany. Same question, Mr. Abraham.
Mr. Abraham. No, they are not.
Mr. Tiffany. Ms. Gorman, do you believe that your State or
this country is safer when criminal illegal aliens are released
into our streets?
Ms. Gorman. No.
Mr. Tiffany. Mr. Abraham?
Mr. Abraham. No, not at all.
Mr. Tiffany. In my home State of Wisconsin we had a
terrible situation, not unlike what you are experiencing, where
there is a sanctuary community, Dane County, that allowed an
illegal immigrant from Venezuela, let him free, and he was
arrested over 100 miles away in a little community, Prairie du
Chien, Wisconsin. The charges were domestic violence, sexual
assault, child abuse, and strangulation.
Fortunately, the woman did not die, but it had to be
horrific. When thinking about that, we should be concerned with
neighboring communities, should places like Missouri, Indiana,
Iowa, and Wisconsin be concerned when there is sanctuary
policies that are on our borders that may affect us when we see
it happen in our own State 100 miles away from a sanctuary
jurisdiction?
Should we be concerned, Mr. Abraham, with those policies
being carried out in the State of Illinois?
Mr. Abraham. If you care about your citizens, you should be
concerned?
Mr. Tiffany. Ms. Gorman?
Ms. Gorman. I sent my daughter to Chicago because I thought
it was safe. You hear all the rhetoric in the politics, I sent
her there because I thought she was safe, no, she wasn't safe.
It never would have occurred to me that this could have
happened. Yes, Mr. Abraham talked about as a parent you worry,
I worry about car accidents, you worry that they will drink too
much.
You never even conceive that she would be murdered, shot in
the back of the head by an illegal immigrant on a pier going to
see the Northern Lights with her friends. It is not even
something you could even conceive. I just have to say one
thing, because it has been plaguing me, and this is how messed
up this situation is, this is why I am sorry I got so upset
with your ``buts,'' and you don't want to talk about this.
This is the fourth hearing. Do you know what I am thankful
for? This is so messed up, I am going to say it, I am thankful
after hearing, I didn't even know what an Angel Family was, I
had no idea, had never even heard about it, there are so many
out here. You know what I am thankful for?
I'm thankful that my daughter was just shot in the back of
the head, not raped, murdered, dismembered, put in a garbage
can like Megan Bos with bleach poured on her, and they didn't
find her for fifty days. You can actually dismiss the Angel
Families, you can say ``but''? You don't want to hear four
sessions on Angel Families? I am sorry, you need to, you need
to.
I am actually thankful that my daughter wasn't raped, how
messed up is that? That I am thankful every day that she was
just murdered, not raped and dismembered. Think about that, how
messed up is that? Do you know what I thought of this morning
when I got up? The joy of--does anyone have a baby here? The
joy of picking out their first outfit that they are going to
wear on their ride home from the hospital.
I had to pick out my daughter's last outfit, and she was a
fabulous dresser. We had a hundred people come to our home, a
hundred friends and family came to our home, we had her
cremated actually after, and they all decorated her urn with
rhinestones. All of them put it on there, she is fabulous even
in death. For the first time, all the excitement of having a
child, and then having people make excuses and ``buts.''
I am sorry, this is unacceptable. There are so many Angel
Families out here, and the day that I have to wake up and be
thankful that my daughter was only shot and not raped should
tell you something. It is crazy.
Mr. Tiffany. Thank you, Ms. Gorman. By the way, you used
the term sorry early on, when you answered that question. You
never have to apologize. Never apologize for the story that you
are delivering to the American people.
Mr. Chair, I yield back.
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman yields back.
Ms. Gorman. Can I just say one thing? I am sorry, I am
sorry I have to be here. I am sorry, I am actually--like I
said, I am a lover, I am a lover, not a fighter, I am not a
public speaker, I am not someone who ever speaks out about
things, I actually am very bitter that I have to be here, No.
1. Now, I am going to have to fight for my daughter. I am sorry
that I have to be here, and that I have to even oppose anyone,
it is crazy.
Mr. McClintock. Thank you.
Ms. Gorman. Sorry.
Ms. Jayapal. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I want to go
to a statement that you ended with, Sheriff Redman, that I
agree with, and I believe this is how you said it, as well as
in your written testimony. Public policy should prioritize
accountability for criminal offenders, protection for victims,
and the safety of law-abiding citizens. I agree with that, and
I think everybody on this side agrees with that.
The question really is what creates that environment most
effectively. I spent some time in my opening statement, and I
know you did as well, Ms. Pierce, talking about how resources
are getting taken from different parts of Department of
Homeland Security, other Federal law enforcement agencies, to
do immigration enforcement that has really focused largely on
people who don't have any convictions.
More importantly, in this context of sanctuary
jurisdictions, has actually hurt law enforcement's ability to
do its job at the local level. I wanted to go to this question
about the central question here is not about whether there
should be justice for Ms. Gorman, and Mr. Abraham's daughter's
murders, there absolutely should be, I don't think there is any
disagreement about that anywhere on this bench, Democrat or
Republican.
The central question is what gets us that accountability
across the board, for everybody? The Trump Administration's
approach has been to force every State, city, and locality to
use their resources, precious resources, quite small in many
jurisdictions, to enforce Federal immigration law. In Mr.
Abraham's case, it sounds like actually that was a Chicago,
that sounds like a State of Illinois issue.
The whole question of where local-law enforcement
prioritizes resources, and what keeps us safer, my question for
you is does the Trump Administration's approach to immigration
enforcement, which is forcing local jurisdictions to enforce
immigration law, is that what keeps us most safe, and prevents
the kinds of things we are hearing about today?
Ms. Pierce. No, it does not. I agree, the central question
here is not only just about accountability, right? It is about
public safety, what can keep us all the safest? There are a few
different problems with what the Trump Administration is doing,
and how they are approaching that, and I will touch on two of
them.
First, the redirection of Federal resources to immigration
enforcement above violent crimes. This Administration has moved
tens of thousands of Federal law enforcement officers away from
their primary duties of going after human trafficking, going
after child sexual exploitation, going after cybercrimes,
terrorism, and violent crime, and instead focused them on
immigration enforcement.
That immigration enforcement work unfortunately is not
focused on the worst of the worst, rather it is focused on
rounding up as many individuals as possible. We are neglecting
terrorists, and we are instead focusing on individuals who have
violated civil immigration law.
Second, that this Administration is bullying jurisdictions
to fully cooperate with immigration enforcement, despite those
jurisdictions' considerations about their own resources. Police
departments have limited resources, and they use those to
decide how much and what level of cooperation they are going to
give to the Trump Administration.
Not only that, but they need to look at their relationships
with their communities. Is a certain level of cooperation with
ICE going to harm the trust that they have established with
their local communities? Is it going to redirect the priorities
that they have decided are best to keep safety in their
communities?
Those are the things that these local jurisdictions need to
decide before they decide what level of cooperation that they
will give ICE. Unfortunately, this Administration doesn't seem
to want to acknowledge that they would rather bully these
jurisdictions into that full cooperation.
Ms. Jayapal. As well as concerns about how much they would
have to pay in lawsuits if what they do is actually
unconstitutional. Why is it dangerous to have policies in
place, this gets at the community trust piece, why is it
dangerous to have policies in place that prevent huge swathes
of the community, both undocumented folks, as well as family
members, or friends of undocumented people who may live in the
same household from feeling secure in calling 911? What happens
in that situation to the safety of all community members?
Ms. Pierce. Police can't be everywhere, right? They rely on
community members to be their eyes and ears, to report crimes,
to be witnesses, and to provide testimony. When those
individuals are no longer willing to cooperate with the police,
when they think that a call to 911 is going to make their lives
worse, that means that those police, their reach into that
network, into the community is then limited.
Ms. Jayapal. Thank you, my time is expired, I yield back.
Mr. McClintock. Mr. Biggs?
Mr. Biggs. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I thank the witnesses
for being here today. Ms. Gorman, thank you particularly, Mr.
Abraham, thank you. I appreciate, Ms. Gorman, the way you
called folks across the aisle out. I want to tell you that this
isn't just the fourth hearing, we actually had a field hearing
in Phoenix, Arizona on this, where we had Angel Families come
in and testify.
Do you know how many from the Democrats came? Not one,
zero, no one came. They didn't care enough to come to that
field hearing, what a shame, really too bad, they needed to
hear what had gone on, we had seven families at that one.
Federal law, I have got it up here, a little bit low behind me
here, says clearly, ``no city, county, or State can block its
officers from sharing immigration information with the Federal
Government.''
It is not complicated. Ms. Pierce, Illinois' TRUST Act,
tells local officers they cannot share information with ICE, is
that a direct violation of Federal law?
Ms. Pierce. It is not, 8 U.S.C. 1373 directs that local
officials cannot restrict officials within their jurisdiction
from sharing information about immigration status.
Mr. Biggs. You don't think this--so if Illinois' law, their
TRUST Act, which says they cannot provide information in
response to any immigration agent's inquiry or request for
information regarding any individual in the agency's custody,
they can't provide that, you don't think that is a violation of
1373? I guess that is why things are so screwed up.
Let me just tell you that we are going to go along here and
talk about Sheridan Gorman and Katie Abraham, because I am
telling you, and I am asserting that this has not been settled
by any court, your statement has not been settled by any court,
and it is under review still. I don't believe that the families
of Sheridan, Katie, or any other Angel Family would say yes,
``you should be allowed to withhold information.''
That is what you saw in this particular case. Sheriff
Redman, you ever see that, your State, they trying to prevent
you from providing this information to ICE or other Federal
authorities?
Sheriff Redman. Yes, sir.
Mr. Biggs. Give us an example please.
Sheriff Redman. We are able to share some limited
information. The gentleman that I--call him gentleman, the
suspect that was arrested in my jurisdiction for the lewd acts
with a child, that information under SB 54 that I provided to
them, was not legally able to provide that information.
Mr. Biggs. We have got a set of facts here. Jose Medina
entered this country illegally, he had no address, no ID, and
no legal status. Went to Chicago, he was arrested for
shoplifting. Chicago had him in custody, ICE was never
notified. He walked out the door, got an OR if I understand
right, never showed back up for his court date, nobody went
looking for him, because that is the way it is, it is a
shoplifting case.
Nobody is going to go look for a shoplifter. Less than
three years later he shot Sheridan Gorman in the head in a
Chicago park. Now, you have got 8 U.S.C. 1324 makes it a
Federal crime to knowingly conceal, harbor, or shield an
illegal alien from detection. Were those facts met, do you
think, Ms. Pierce, when Chicago took Medina into custody, they
knew he was in the country illegally.
They knew he had a criminal charge pending, they released
him back onto the street, did they shield, do you think that
was shielding?
Ms. Pierce. No, sir. When Medina was booked into custody,
those fingerprints were shared with the Department of Homeland
Security, and with ICE, ICE had access to that information.
Mr. Biggs. Did they transfer him to ICE? The answer is no.
The question would be at what point does systematically
refusing to notify ICE, knowing an individual is unlawfully
present, has a criminal record, cross into shielding someone
from detection? That is really the question here. You can take
that position to say well, you know what, we just don't think
that is right.
That is what a sanctuary jurisdiction does, they say we are
not going to provide that information, if ICE has a detainer,
we are not going to transfer them to them, because they want
only a criminal arrest warrant. They don't want an ICE hold,
they don't want an ICE detainer, and they want an actual
criminal arrest warrant, those are two distinctive things.
What you do is allow a very dangerous, illegal alien back
onto the street, wreaking havoc in our communities. That is the
pissant shame of it all.
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman's time is expired. Mr.
Raskin?
Mr. Raskin. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Ms. Pierce, I remember
when we started this term of Congress, and Elon Musk, and DOGE
wiped out about $500 million of grants that were going to
victim assistance groups, crime fighting groups, and local
police departments. Nobody could quite explain why the
particular DOGE employee did that.
They wiped out about a half a billion dollars of grants
going to help the families of victims, and to try to stop
crime. Can you discuss what happened there, what were those
grants, why did that happen, and what kind of effect does that
have when money that we have appropriated from Congress for
this purpose, and the grants or programs that are wiped out,
what effect does that have?
Ms. Pierce. Sure. It was actually $820 million in
Department of Justice grants that they canceled, $500 million
of which had already been granted. That means the organizations
that were receiving those grants had already started hiring
staff, renting spaces, the communities that were going to
receive those public safety grants had already started relying
on that money coming in, and all that was wiped away.
I have recently been working with the victim rights law
center, which is an amazing nonprofit organization in
Massachusetts. They have lost three attorneys so far because of
the way that the Department of Justice is messing with these
public safety grants. That means victims, hundreds of victims
of sexual assault and rape no longer have attorneys because
that public safety funding has disappeared.
Mr. Raskin. It is not just victim assistance groups, it is
also crime fighting groups, and police departments had millions
of dollars of grants that were canceled, correct? To my
recollection.
Ms. Pierce. Absolutely, yes.
Mr. Raskin. Have the Office of Justice Programs grants from
Fiscal Year 2025 been reinstated and distributed?
Ms. Pierce. We were talking earlier about canceled grants,
right? There is another problem with the Department of Justice
grants, in that they have significantly slowed down the amount
of grants that are going across the United States, not only for
organizations, but also for police departments.
In the Fiscal Year 2025, the Department of Justice grants
that go through the Office of Justice Programs have not been
fully granted.
Mr. Raskin. Why is that happening?
Ms. Pierce. I don't know, the Department of Justice has not
spoken to why this has happened. This is an unprecedented thing
that has caused disruption across our country, and the
Department of Justice is not telling anyone why they have been
delaying this. It is more than $2 billion in grants that have
not gone--
Mr. Raskin. Two billion dollars did you say?
Ms. Pierce. Two billion dollars.
Mr. Raskin. What would that $2 billion have been able to do
for local police forces around the country?
Ms. Pierce. It would be used to hire officers, it would be
used to train officers, it would be used to support officer
wellness programs, it would be used to support resources for
law enforcement, such as body cameras, different things that
they desperately need.
Mr. Raskin. Our system is complex because it is a Federal
system, so we have national government, Department of Justice,
Federal policies, and we have State and local policies, and you
described this tension, this hostility that is creating
problems. Can you discuss how jurisdictions normally cooperate
with the Federal Government in different ways, and how does it
best work?
Ms. Pierce. Sure, I mean talking specifically about
immigration enforcement--
Mr. Raskin. Sure.
Ms. Pierce. Like I said during my testimony, every single
law enforcement jurisdiction across the United States
cooperates with immigration enforcement, every time someone is
booked, that information is sent to the Department of Homeland
Security, and to ICE, and then jurisdictions from there need to
decide how much more of their local resources they will lend to
ICE and immigration enforcement to help ICE do its job.
Mr. Raskin. OK, will you just help us understand the
different resources that are available to the Federal
Government, and then to local government police forces?
Ms. Pierce. Sure. As I said during my testimony, this
Congress has provided ICE with $113.5 billion to do their job,
to enforce immigration law in the United States, and that is
more than the combined annual operating budget of every single
local-law enforcement jurisdiction in America. We are talking
about local police departments that have limited amount of
resources, and their primary duty is public safety.
Their primary duty is not immigration enforcement.
Meanwhile, we have a Federal agency who has a budget larger
than all but four militaries in the world, and their primary
duty is in civil immigration enforcement.
Mr. Raskin. What would you suggest we work on a bipartisan
basis in Congress in to reduce criminal violence by
undocumented immigrants, but in general, because there are
people suffering these tragedies generally across the country,
what can we do to bring down the crime rate generally, and all
the violence?
Ms. Pierce. Those resources that ICE receives should be
targeted at the biggest public safety threats, right? We
shouldn't have a Federal agency that is running amok across the
United States trying to fulfill a quota to get as many people
into detention and deportation as possible, that is not making
us safer. In addition, we need a Federal Government that is
willing to work with local-law enforcement jurisdictions.
We have had ICE in the past have compromise and
communication be their primary driver when they are working
with local jurisdictions. That goes a lot further than the
bullying that we see from this Administration. That only
increases the distrust that we are seeing at the Federal level,
between the Federal level, the State, and local level.
Mr. Raskin. Thank you, I yield back, Mr. Chair.
Mr. McClintock. Mr. Roy?
Mr. Roy. I thank the Chair, thank you for holding this
hearing. Mr. Redman, thank you for your service in law
enforcement. Ms. Gorman and Mr. Abraham, sorry for your loss, I
have gotten to know all too often too many Angel Families, too
many people in my home State of Texas who have lost loved ones
due to the absolute, abject failure of leaders in both parties,
to be very clear.
I will be a little partisan here, and very specifically the
previous Administration, in particular, and my colleagues on
the other side of the aisle, and their absolute refusal to
secure the border. Ms. Gorman, it struck me that you noted that
we had this poster, and it alluded to the extent to which the
Federal Government, in particular, and law enforcement in this
country failed you, and failed your daughter more importantly
at multiple levels across the board.
That is really important, especially in light of the
questioning we just heard from the Ranking Member of the Full
Committee with Ms. Pierce, who is appearing before us here
today. Ms. Pierce, now you have worked previously for USCIS in
the previous Administration, is that correct?
Ms. Pierce. During both the previous Administration and
this Administration, yes.
Mr. Roy. You have been testifying here at the questioning
about the resources, and the lack of resources for local-law
enforcement, and grants not being given out, but then dollars
that have been set aside for ICE. The question here is how much
taxpayer funds should have to be spent right now, how many
taxpayer dollars of current American taxpayers should have to
be spent to go round up illegal aliens?
Ms. Pierce. Unfortunately, the better question is how that
money should be spent, not how much.
Mr. Roy. Wait a minute, no, I actually think it matters how
much. Because with all due respect, Ms. Pierce, you were
working under the previous Administration, if I remember
correctly, with Safe Mobility Offices. Safe Mobility Offices,
now these were offices that were directed and designated toward
helping people move through our security system to get to the
United States.
To end run the processes along the way, to exploit asylum
laws, to exploit parole laws to funnel people into the United
States. That was precisely what was happening in the previous
Administration, we know this to be true. Then, to sit here and
listen to this exchange about what we are doing with our
resources really strikes me as pretty hypocritical.
Given the extent to which we have dangerous people in the
United States that have been killing innocent Americans because
the previous Administration and the people who worked for it
were working directly, specifically to end run the laws of the
United States, putting the dangerous people on the streets that
resulted in the death of Ms. Gorman's daughter and Mr.
Abraham's family.
I have gotten to know Jocelyn Nungaray as a dear friend, or
her mother, Alexis Nungaray as a dear friend for the loss of
her daughter Jocelyn. We are well advised by Laken Riley, we
are well advised of those who have lost loved ones, Kayla
Hamilton, and many others, and we are hearing more here. You
are right, Ms. Gorman, we can't have enough.
We can keep having hearings and allowing these people to
put pictures up of the people who have been murdered because we
allow our borders to be used as some sort of plaything. Now,
today the U.S. Supreme Court manufacturing out of thin air a
complete abomination of a ruling by the chief justice,
suggesting that you can simply become a citizen from being born
on dirt.
Thereby validating the abhorrent practice of baby factories
and moving people here to be born to be able to become a
citizen, leaving us under no choice but to do what we must do
to say pause immigration, just stop it, stop all immigration.
Because if it is going to be exploited for people to come here
when they are pregnant, to allow somebody who is working for
the Chinese Communist Party, and to come here and have children
who become American citizens.
Then, have our laws exploited like they were under the
previous Administration; it is why this Congress should act to
pause all immigration. This Congress should act immediately to
codify what the President has been doing to close the loopholes
under asylum and parole, the catch and release policies.
To codify those that a future Biden and Mayorkas
Administration cannot do to the American people what these
radical leftists did to the American people, and then dare sit
here and testify under questioning by my colleagues that we
need to have more taxpayer money going to the local
jurisdictions to make up for what they caused.
Then, criticize the Administration and this Congress for
putting money aside for ICE and Border Patrol to do the job
that Administration wouldn't do. By the way, get that funding
by having to figure out how to use reconciliation to do it,
because Democrats refuse to appropriate money to secure our
communities, and to make sure that our people would not be
murdered.
It is the absolute chutzpah to be here testifying, having
had a hand in South America working to end run our laws, and
put people into the United States that resulted in the deaths
of the American people. I yield back.
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman yields back. Mr. Nadler?
Mr. Nadler. Mr. Chair, let me begin by offering my deepest
condolences to Ms. Gorman and Mr. Abraham. The loss of a child
is unimaginable and is something no parent should ever face.
Mr. Chair, Republicans want to coerce States and localities
into furthering the Trump Administration's extreme anti-
immigrant agenda.
With masked agents murdering American citizens in the
streets, tearing children away from their parents, and
detention facilities that have their highest death rate in
decades and fail to meet the basic medical and sanitary needs
of detainees. It is no wonder that many States and localities
have chosen not to use their limited resources to aid and abet
the Trump Administration's reckless, chaotic, and inhumane mass
deportation campaign.
Some communities have concluded that certain forms of
cooperation with Federal immigration authorities such as
detaining immigrants past their sentences without a judicial
order raise constitutional concerns and can even put them at
risk of legal liability.
In many cases States and localities have determined that
taking on the Federal responsibility to enforce immigration
laws would destroy trust between immigrants and local-law
enforcement, which would make everyone less safe. They believe
that their communities are at greater risk when a victim of
domestic violence is afraid to ask the police for protection
from her abuser for fear of deportation.
When witnesses to a murder refuse to assist law enforcement
in tracking down their perpetrator because they are afraid
their immigration status will be discovered. Republicans
actually want to punish these communities by denying them
billions of dollars in funding that they need to protect public
safety. Federal immigration authorities are perfectly capable
of enforcing Federal law on their own.
In fact, they are swimming in money, Congress has given
them $240 billion in little more than a year with no guardrails
attached. With this money, these agencies have assembled a
massive force consisting of tens of thousands of agents who
have flooded our streets to carry out Donald Trump's brutal and
reckless campaign to strike fear in immigrant communities
across the country.
That is what the Committee should be examining today. Ms.
Pierce, immigration enforcement is the responsibility of the
Federal Government, and the DHS has unprecedented resources and
historic levels of funding. Does the Federal Government have
the resources and personnel necessary to enforce immigration
law, or does it need to usurp State resources?
Ms. Pierce. As you said, sir, ICE has unprecedented
resources. At the moment we should assess what they can do with
those resources before we have them usurp local resources.
Mr. Nadler. Thank you. Ms. Pierce, the Trump Administration
claims that it is only going after the worst of the worst, and
targeting criminals, but according to ICE's own data, the
majority of immigrants they have detained have no criminal
record. In fact, this Administration's mass deportation agenda
is wreaking havoc on communities across the country.
Now, Republicans want to force States, cities, and
localities to participate in this lawless, and dangerous
scheme--
Mr. Knott. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. Nadler. No. Is the Trump Administration really going
after the worst of the worst?
Ms. Pierce. No, sir. According to ICE's own data, more than
70 percent of individuals in detention have no criminal
records, and another recent analysis said only three percent of
those individuals in detention have violent criminal
convictions.
Mr. Nadler. Ms. Pierce, can you explain why Administrative
ICE detainers often raise constitutional concerns, and can
create liability for States, cities, and localities?
Ms. Pierce. Because they don't create new legal authority
for a new detention. If an individual is done with their
criminal custody, then the local-law enforcement agency needs a
new authority to continue detaining that individual. A detainer
is just a suggestion from ICE, or a request from ICE that local
jurisdiction continue to hold that individual.
It doesn't create a new legal authority, and as a result,
some jurisdictions have had to pay hundreds of millions of
dollars in civil liabilities and settlements for holding
individuals beyond the time that they were supposed to be
released from custody.
Mr. Nadler. Thank you, Mr. Pierce. The Trump Administration
has diverted over 28,000 officers from their law enforcement
roles in the Federal Government to do immigration enforcement.
How does this shifting focus from criminal enforcement to
immigration enforcement hurt public safety?
Ms. Pierce. I feel like very few people would argue that
taking officers who were focused on violent crime, child
exploitation, human trafficking, firearms trafficking, fentanyl
smuggling, and putting them instead to focus on civil
immigration enforcement, that doesn't increase public safety,
it pulls individuals away from their primary public safety
missions.
Also, unfortunately, this Administration has failed to
answer questions from Congress about how many, exactly, agents
were pulled away from their primary public safety duties. What
analysis if any was done prior to pulling them about what that
would do to their primary public safety missions. What would it
do to the open cases that they abandon to focus instead on
increasing immigration enforcement?
We haven't heard a word from this Administration about
whether or not they are weighing those important public safety
considerations.
Mr. Nadler. Thank you, Ms. Pierce. My time is expired; I
yield back.
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman yields back. Mr. Van Drew?
Mr. Van Drew. Thank you, Chair. I am going to say it is
telling the truth time, and first I want to thank you,
especially Mr. Abraham and Ms. Gorman, you must be so tired, so
worn out, it is like probably a surreal world, it is like hell
on earth. Condolences don't do it. The only thing we can ever
do is by actions.
Because the truth matters, and you are in a place right now
in Washington, DC, I am not going to go into it because I only
have five minutes, you could talk about it for hours, where a
lot of times the truth doesn't matter. You hear so much BS, and
so much debating, political philosophy, and the reality is you
guys are here because you don't want other kids to die, that is
all it is about.
Both of you I don't necessarily believe are usually people
who want to be having orations, debates, speaking out, and all
the, forgive me, BS goes on around you, and it swirls around
you, man, it gets old. It is tell the truth time. The truth is
it doesn't matter if we do this four times, 40 times, 400
times, or 4,000 damn times.
It needs to be done because innocent children and people
have lost their lives, or have been dismembered, or have been
raped, or have been injured, and it didn't have to be that way.
I don't know how damn clear, you made it so clear, you both
articulated so well, there are no words. We know what the truth
is about, the truth is in sanctuary cities, people die because
it is a sanctuary city.
Ms. Pierce, forgive me, but we have people that were on the
street because it was a sanctuary city, or a sanctuary county,
or a sanctuary State, or a jurisdiction, whatever it was, and
people are not walking, and living on this earth because of
that policy.
I don't mean to be mean to you, I understand you are just
doing your job here, but all the politically Left gobbledygook,
and the statistics, and all the stuff you are moving around,
that doesn't mean anything to them. Look to the right, and look
to the left, and tell them about all your political stuff, and
all that you have done, all that Left-wing political nonsense
doesn't mean anything to them.
Their kids aren't alive, that is all that matters to them.
That is all that will matter for the rest of their lives. The
truth is somebody said that we don't know the definition of a
sanctuary city, yes, we do, it is a place where we don't
cooperate with Federal officials. When we have somebody who is
a bad person, who broke a crime besides being illegal, we don't
cooperate.
You know why there are so many problems in the Blue cities?
Because they don't cooperate, because ICE does not want to go
out and have crowd control, they don't want to be involved in
that, they don't want to have to do any of that. They want
people when they are incarcerated, and they are illegal, to be
notified, so they can send them out of the country.
Because I don't even want them imprisoned here. We can't
afford it; they shouldn't be here. We pay for their clothing,
we pay for their housing in some cases, we pay for their
transportation. In New Jersey where I am from, it makes me sick
to my stomach, we are paying for a legal defense fund for
illegal criminals. We pay for their education, we can't afford
it and we are tired of it.
Your issues are even more important because it is life and
death. Ms. Pierce, and I don't think you are going to do--I
have a request, but I don't think you will do it. I would
really love you to look to your right, because they will look
to you, and look to your left, tell them about all your
numbers, all your grants, all your BS, and why we shouldn't
arrest and deport people who are here illegally and commit
crimes.
Do you want to do that? Explain to them, and also explain
to the sheriff why you are correct, and he is wrong, even
though he has been on the ground, and in the street, have you
served in law enforcement, have you been a law enforcement
official?
Ms. Pierce. No, sir.
Mr. Van Drew. OK, he has seen it, he has been on the
street, he has seen the blood and the guts. This isn't some
philosophical thing out in space we are talking about; these
are real people who are really getting hurt because of bad
politics. I have time for one question. In your testimony you
listed, Ms. Pierce, four practical concerns that you say drive
the needs for sanctuary policies.
We should have sanctuary policies because of your
complicated formula here, community trust, local control, legal
liability, and staffing. Can you look at them, and say that
those four pillars of your thesis, or your idea, of your think
tank are worth the lives of their children? I am just asking
you a question, please answer it.
Ms. Pierce. Yes, I would love to answer it. The children of
Mr. Abraham and Ms. Gorman should be alive. The fact that they
are not is a travesty, and I am extremely apologetic about
that--
Mr. Van Drew. It is because of your policies, you are the
one doing it. No offense, but you are.
Ms. Pierce. I am here today to testify to the American
people and to Congress about how Federal policies should
operate. I am an expert on Federal policy--
Mr. Van Drew. I am out of time, thank you, I yield back.
Mr. McClintock. Ms. Ross?
Ms. Ross. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I too very sincerely want
to express my condolences to Ms. Gorman and to Mr. Abraham.
What happened to your children should never have happened, and
Ms. Gorman, I look forward to sitting on the bench. I do want
to share, because I know every single one of my police chiefs,
and I know my sheriff.
I do want to share how important it is that our local-law
enforcement get funding, and get grants so they can prevent
crimes, respond to crimes, and make sure our communities are
safe. That is from everybody who commits crimes, illegal
immigrants, legal immigrants, and American citizens, we need to
make sure we give our law enforcement at the local level
closest to the community the tools that they need.
Every single time I can get a community project for my
local-law enforcement, I do it. I am however very concerned
that the Trump Administration has stopped some of the grants to
local-law enforcement to help hire new officers, to get the
equipment that they need. I understand that we now have
unprecedented investment in ICE and CBP, and that there are a
whole lot of hiring and bonuses.
My local-law enforcement sometimes loses some of their best
people to ICE and CBP, but it is a free country and take the
job that you think you should be doing, I think that is fine. I
want to know a little bit more about these grants. I was
concerned, Ms. Pierce, I didn't know you were going to mention
that North Carolina, which is my home State, was one of the
States that hasn't gotten grants.
We are not a sanctuary city State, so could you talk a
little bit more about the grants that my State has lost?
Because we are not doing the things that my friends on the
other side of the aisle claim are so bad.
Ms. Pierce. Absolutely. The grants I mentioned that have
been delayed, the Fiscal Year 2025 grants, the $4.5 billion
that should have been given out more than nine months ago, they
actually should be going to every single State in the country.
Majority on this Committee, because I think that this is a real
issue--
Ms. Ross. The States, you mean.
Ms. Pierce. I am sorry, the States, thank you. Represented
by the Majority on this Committee, because I think this is a
real and important issue that this Committee should be
examining. Every single State in the United States is missing
public safety grant funding that should have been given to them
more than nine months ago.
Ms. Ross. Could you tell me what that grant funding would
go toward?
Ms. Pierce. Funding from the Office of Justice Programs
goes to a wide variety of resources that help protect local
safety. They go to law enforcement officers to help with
hiring, to help with officer training, and to help with officer
wellness. They also go to organizations out in the community
that help represent individuals.
It also goes to organizations that help prevent gun
violence. A variety of issues all designed to increase public
safety in the United States.
Ms. Ross. OK, I wanted to ask, I only have about a minute
and a half, but you briefly mentioned how there has been
diversion from child exploitation cases, could you explain how
agents have been pulled off child exploitation cases?
Ms. Pierce. Absolutely. Homeland Security Investigations is
a wing of ICE. Unfortunately, this Administration has pulled
many of the individuals who specialize in the specific crimes
that HSI focuses on to instead focus on immigration
enforcement, and that includes individuals focused on child
exploitation cases.
These are very specialized agents that work on these cases.
When they leave them, the cases can't just be picked back up at
a later time, instead the evidence gets outdated, more children
are vulnerable to exploitation, and predators get longer to
work on them. It is extremely concerning that this
Administration would pull investigators from those cases.
Ms. Ross. Have they been pulled from human trafficking
cases?
Ms. Pierce. Yes, absolutely. Homeland Security
Investigations, which has lost so many agents to instead focus
on civil immigration enforcement, also focuses on human
trafficking, drug smuggling, cartels, a variety of issues that
are very important to the public safety of the United States.
Ms. Ross. OK, thank you, I yield back.
Mr. McClintock. The gentlelady yields back. Mr. Moore?
Mr. Moore. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Ms. Gorman, thank you for
being here today. Mr. Abraham, certainly sorry for your loss.
Sheriff, we hear a lot of talk about grants and funding, but it
seems like to me you have a bigger problem with some of the
laws actually, you may have the resources to do some things
sometimes.
It seems like State laws, sanctuary States, and cities, and
communities actually create a bigger hurdle for you sometimes.
What specific authority or cooperation do you need to prevent a
removable offender from being released back into the community
before ICE can take lawful custody?
Sheriff Redman. Thank you. We don't spend a whole lot of
resources on any type of immigration enforcement, we have no
authority to do that. When I keep hearing that our resources
are tapped, what they are actually tapped into is when they
come into our custody, that is where we are getting hit by
these sanctuary laws, where it is impacting my budget, precious
jail bed spaces.
That has a huge impact, it is not that we are out there
doing any type of enforcement, we never have, and we never
will, that is a Federal component of the government. What we
need to have happen is those low-level offenses that don't fall
within California SB 54, the 16 I mentioned, and Ms. Pierce did
put out some numbers.
Out of seven that I gave over to ICE, I had 16 that I could
not turn over because they did not meet the high-level offenses
where I could cooperate with ICE, and those were released back
into the community, I need that to change.
Mr. Moore. I was talking to a judge who is a friend of
mine, and under the prior Administration, he would actually
have people in his courtroom that were driving under the
influence that were here illegally, and very often if he turned
them over, they would take them down the road and turn them
loose. Angel and Jeremy Seay actually died in my community.
A drunk driver, Mr. Abraham, much like what you described,
they had him, they turned him loose, he was a repeat offender,
and then he was back out on the street again, and ultimately
killed two newlyweds, young newlyweds. Ms. Gorman, I understand
that the individual that murdered Sheridan had been in prior
custody, and they had been released.
Do you want to tell me a little bit about the details? And
then if you don't mind, tell us what real accountability looks
like to your families, and to the communities when we have
these sanctuary jurisdictions?
Ms. Gorman. Sure. I just have to say that I am not a
lawmaker, and I am not a politician, but one of the things that
I searched on ChatGPT of all things, when we found out that
Sheridan was murdered by an illegal immigrant, and when we
found out what Angel Families were, I was curious. One night I
went online, and I said how many people have been killed by
illegal immigrants in Chicago, or in Illinois, I did both.
Do you know what the answer was? Without being point blank,
it basically said that Chicago police are not allowed to track
that information, they are not allowed to ask, so we don't
know. The answer is we don't know how many people have been
killed by illegal immigrants in Chicago or in Illinois. In my
opinion that is the biggest part.
We keep talking about programs being taken away, and
funding, it is about cooperation, it is about sitting on that
bench together and just saying I am going to tell you my side,
you tell me yours and let us find a way to cooperate. I don't
think that the sanctuary cities are cooperating. Yes, this man
apparently came across the border and was actually asked the
questions.
Which apparently you would know about, because you were
helping facilitating people coming over illegally. Asked the
questions whether they claim asylum, are they in danger, and
need to be rescued by the United States, and this man actually
answered no, and yet we took him anyway. There are so many
steps.
Yes, this man was arrested, he was arrested when he came to
Chicago for stealing at a Macy's apparently, and then because
of cashless bail policies, they just released him back on the
street. The original intent I believe of cashless bail was that
these people are from our community, so the chances of them
coming back to court are high because they are part of the
community.
That doesn't apply to illegal immigrants, this man didn't
have an address. The fact that he was even released on his own
recognizance, how do we know this man is not even using a
different name? We trust that the name he gave himself is Jose
Medina. There is so much wrong with these policies, cashless
bail, sanctuary cities, it is a roundabout.
The sad thing is that I've had to educate myself, my
husband, we have had to educate ourselves on immigration law.
Really it is disgusting, there is so many little loopholes, and
the fact that Chicago is not even allowed to ask if someone who
commits a murder is an illegal immigrant, they are not allowed
to store that information, that should tell you everything you
need to know.
It is an evasive game of shifting cards, and shifting
blame, and frankly, yes, sitting here, when yes, I am thankful
my daughter wasn't dismembered. I need people to think about
that. You don't have to be a parent to feel the pain that we
are feeling, and the betrayal. One of the things that happened,
I am sorry I have done this, but one of the things that
happened is we are in Chicago getting ready to claim my
daughter's body.
The mayor there is naming a truck Abolish ICE, standing,
laughing, and joking while my daughter was just murdered there.
Like what?
Mr. Moore. Thank you, Ms. Gorman. I yield back, Mr. Chair.
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman's time is expired. Mr. Knott?
Ms. Gorman. Sorry about that.
Mr. Knott. No, no, Ms. Gorman, Mr. Abraham, thank you for
your testimony today. Sheriff, thank you for your service, Ms.
Pierce, thank you for being here. I again, I stated this often
as the father of two precious girls, I can't imagine being in
your chair, and I am sorry. Because again, we have not only a
refusal to apologize for the policies, but we are trying to
bake in the lie that these crimes were unavoidable.
That is the lie that no one will talk about. Both of these
crimes were avoidable; they should never have happened.
Unfortunately, for my colleagues on the other side, had
President Trump been in office from 2000-2024, both of your
daughters would be alive. That is the elephant in the room
here. That is the absolute elephant in the room.
The idea that these crimes are unavoidable is one of the
biggest lies that I can't really tolerate anymore, I really
can't. Look at Jose Medina, apprehended by the Border Patrol on
May 9, 2023. He told immigration officials he did not have any
fear of harm or death. He was marked by Border Patrol as
someone who was likely to abscond.
He asked to be deported to Columbia. He could not provide
any point of contact inside the United States. The Democrats
behind Biden-Harris programmatically ushered him into the
country, paying for his healthcare, his food, and his clothing.
My colleagues here today on the other side will not say it was
avoidable.
He was arrested for theft, he did not show up to court, two
crimes. Not a conviction, this is very important, it was not a
conviction, two crimes. They say we don't deport anybody unless
they have a conviction, well it is very hard to convict someone
when you don't prosecute them. He then murdered a precious
American child, a young lady for doing nothing more than
looking at the Northern Lights.
Again, it is the biggest lie that is being told in
Congress, that these crimes are unavoidable. The second case,
Mr. Abraham's daughter, you said that Mr. Bol was deported once
before, do you know what he was deported for?
Mr. Abraham. I don't know why, I can't get that information
from Illinois, but he was--
Mr. Knott. You can't get it from Illinois?
Mr. Abraham. No.
Mr. Knott. I wonder why.
Mr. Abraham. I can't get anything from Illinois. He was
also using aliases, he was presenting himself as a Mexican
national, not a Guatemalan national. Federal agencies knew
that, but the State didn't bother checking.
Mr. Knott. Yes, well I can tell both of you I did work in
the Department of Justice under President Obama, under
President Trump, and under President Biden. It was a
programmatic effort to bring as many people into the country as
they could, and to keep them here regardless of what they did.
I do have to ask you, Ms. Pierce, one question.
You said that sanctuary jurisdictions do not prevent ICE or
immigration enforcement. Do you stand by that comment?
Ms. Pierce. Yes, sir.
Mr. Knott. We have heard testimony in this Committee of
sanctuary jurisdictions that consider immigration consequences
before they finalize cases, before they charge cases, before
they plead cases, are you aware of that?
Ms. Pierce. Yes, sir.
Mr. Knott. Will you condemn that?
Ms. Pierce. That both U.S. citizens and immigrants should
be charged, and treated--
Mr. Knott. I didn't ask that. Will you condemn considering
immigration policies before charging or resolving cases?
Ms. Pierce. I don't think immigration should be a
consideration when we are talking about criminal law--
Mr. Knott. Because when they do that, it does affect
immigration enforcement, correct?
Ms. Pierce. We are not talking about criminal law; we are
not talking about civil immigration enforcement.
Mr. Knott. I am talking about criminal illegal immigrants,
ma'am. Someone sat in that very chair and said I will release
somebody if they are an illegal immigrant and they are charged
with a serious felony; I questioned them two weeks ago. That
would affect immigration enforcement, would it not?
Ms. Pierce. ICE can pick them up whether or not they are
charged, sir.
Mr. Knott. Asking a Biden official to talk about border
policy is pretty laughable, I have got to say so. It is past
time that we as Americans do stand up and say that American
children are treasures, they are unique. Protecting them should
be our foremost priority. That is impossible when you embrace
open borders. That is impossible when you welcome people from
all over the world, regardless of who they are here.
Mr. McClintock. Thank you.
Mr. Knott. Thank you, I yield back.
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman's time is expired. Ms.
Scanlon?
Ms. Scanlon. Thank you, Mr. Chair. At this point I feel
like I shouldn't be surprised by some of the wild stories and
fantasies that Republicans on this Committee have embraced when
they talk about sanctuary cities to really ramp up political
drama, even if is at the expense of individuals' pain and
personal tragedy, but it is always jarring to hear the lies
being embraced.
According to our Republican colleagues, most immigrants to
our country are criminals, despite the overwhelming evidence,
and as even Ms. Gorman said, ``we have good immigrants among
us.''
Ms. Gorman. They came here legally, so they aren't
criminals.
Ms. Scanlon. Exactly, but that distinction seems to get
lost on this Committee. Evidence is immigrants are actually
more law abiding that Native born Americans overall, and we
have the fact that over 70 percent of the immigrants detained
by this Administration actually have no criminal record either
here or in their home countries. According to our Republican
colleagues, sanctuary policies block ICE from doing its job.
According to our Republican colleagues, elected officials
in cities with so called sanctuary jurisdictions are scheming
to protect immigrant criminals at the expense of their own
constituents, or they are not prosecuting immigrants who commit
crimes. How could any of that actually be possible? No one
would agree to elect officials who deliberately make their own
communities less safe.
No one would agree to live in such places. Law enforcement
professionals are not in the practice of endangering their
communities by allowing criminals, no matter where they came
from, to run rampant. These arguments become a complete
distortion of the truth about policies that cities and States
put in place to improve trust, cooperation, and ultimately
safety in those communities.
Here is the reality, over and over again, congressional
Republicans have used this Committee to support the Trump
Administration as it tries to force State and local-law
enforcement to use their own limited resources to do the
Federal Government's job. Even though they have sent almost a
quarter trillion dollars to DHS and ICE.
To support this Administration's chaotic, out of control,
mass deportation agenda that both doesn't go after the worst of
the worst, and has actively harmed, endangered, and even killed
innocent people, including American citizens. In doing so, our
colleagues have supported the defunding of law enforcement by
blocking resources for local police.
Diverting resources at the Federal level for fighting child
trafficking, terrorism, drug trafficking, corporate overreach,
fraud, and more. Ms. Pierce, we have heard a lot of rhetoric
about so-called sanctuary jurisdictions, but I think it is
pretty well established now that there isn't even a single
definition for that term.
Can you describe for us what sanctuary policies actually
do, what their purpose is, where they have been adopted, and
what effect do they have?
Ms. Pierce. Thank you. Jurisdictions adopt sanctuary
policies, or policies in which they limit the amount that they
cooperate with civil immigration enforcement to protect their
own resources, to protect their criminal and civil liability to
protect their communities, and the trust that they have
established with their local communities. Those policies limit
how much they lend their resources to ICE to do civil
immigration enforcement.
Ms. Scanlon. I am just trying to make plain, or
understandable how sanctuary policies protect local resources.
How does that work, how does going the extra yard--well first,
are there any jurisdictions in the country that you are aware
of that actually violate Federal law with respect to
cooperating with ICE where it is required by law?
Ms. Pierce. Not that I am aware of, no.
Ms. Scanlon. OK, not that I am aware of either. There is
this middle ground where ICE would like local jurisdictions to
take extra steps to detain people longer on the local dime, or
to take other actions that actually cost our cities and States
money, can you talk about that a little bit?
Ms. Pierce. Yes, absolutely. An ICE detainer for example,
requesting that a local jurisdiction hold someone beyond the
time that they would be in criminal custody, that takes up jail
space, as well as personnel time. Then it also subjects that
local jurisdiction to legal liability for which they can be
charged hundreds of millions of dollars in liabilities, or in
civil settlements.
Ms. Scanlon. That legal liability is if, for example, ICE
wants someone detained who shouldn't be detained?
Ms. Pierce. If ICE fails to establish probable cause, or
another legal authority to hold someone beyond the time that
they would be in criminal custody, yes, that local jurisdiction
holds the legal liability for holding that individual beyond
their time in custody.
Mr. McClintock. The gentlelady's time is expired. Mr. Fry?
Ms. Scanlon. Thank you, I yield back.
Mr. Fry. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I really appreciate the
witnesses, Ms. Gorman and Mr. Abraham, you are being here today
sharing that. It is incredibly brave. It is not an easy thing
to do.
I appreciate you being here and talking about your
children. Talking about the failures of the system and what
would have resulted if we had actually done our job, if the
Government had done its job.
Ms. Pierce, the Ranking Member of this Subcommittee, has
sponsored legislation in the past to abolish ICE. Do you
believe that we should abolish ICE?
Ms. Pierce. No, sir.
Mr. Fry. When people call ICE slave camps or the Gestapo,
do you believe that this is an accurate reflection of ICE?
Ms. Pierce. There are a lot of problems with the current
approach to immigration enforcement. No, I would not use those
words.
Mr. Fry. Why do you think, as the Democrat witness here
today, which is that you would disagree with the Ranking Member
of the Subcommittee and other Members of this Committee and
this Congress that want to abolish ICE, why do you think that
we should not abolish ICE?
Ms. Pierce. Immigration enforcement has a role in keeping
us all safe and a role in the proper function of our
government.
Mr. Fry. Do you believe that is where most of Americans are
at, is they also want to abolish ICE?
Ms. Pierce. No, sir.
Mr. Fry. Why do you think that is?
Ms. Pierce. In the United States, we care a lot about our
laws being enforced.
Mr. Fry. Enforcement, what a novel concept. When the last
Administration, you have had a lot of criticisms in this
hearing today about this Administration. What do you think the
last Administration failed at, just briefly?
Ms. Pierce. The last Administration could have done more,
and more quickly, to control the Southern border.
Mr. Fry. In what way?
Ms. Pierce. Limiting the benefits given to individuals
crossing the Southern border, when it comes especially to
asylum.
Mr. Fry. Don't give them free stuff, right? Don't open, is
that what you are saying? Limiting the benefits? Don't give
them free stuff that incentivizes them. Do you think that this
incentivizes them to come to the country?
Ms. Pierce. No asylum seeker gets free stuff. To be clear,
I am talking about the benefit of asylum, an immigration
benefit.
Mr. Fry. In your written testimony, you wrote that there is
a smarter path the Trump Administration can do with sanctuary
jurisdictions, and highlighting how some jurisdictions may be
willing to cooperate in serious cases.
You also wrote that focus immigration enforcement on
serious public safety threats. What do you consider a serious
case or a serious public safety threat?
Ms. Pierce. We could look at criminal law, we can look at
violations, then we can decide which of those are more
concerning.
Mr. Fry. Well, you are the expert, so I am asking you, what
do you consider, this is in your public testimony, what do you
consider a serious case or a serious public safety threat?
Ms. Pierce. There is a lot to that answer that I would like
more time than five minutes to consider.
Mr. Fry. Well, like what? Like a felony, would a felony be
considered a serious case?
Ms. Pierce. Absolutely.
Mr. Fry. Like a DUI, would that be considered a serious
case?
Ms. Pierce. It depends on the circumstances. A DUI is an
extremely serious violation.
Mr. Fry. What about in the case of Mr. Abraham's daughter?
A DUI, a prior charge or conviction, would that be considered a
serious case?
Ms. Pierce. A DUI is a significant violation of our laws.
Mr. Fry. What about shoplifting?
Ms. Pierce. Again, it is a significant violation of our
laws.
Mr. Fry. Now, shoplifting is, I guess, a misdemeanor. Would
you still consider shoplifting a serious case?
Ms. Pierce. In my testimony, I talked about how this
Administration should work with local jurisdictions to decide
with them what are serious cases. Where are those jurisdictions
willing to lend local resources to help ICE do its job?
That those conversations would be more fruitful than this
Administration's approach, which is instead to name and shame
jurisdictions that it sees as not cooperating.
Mr. Fry. The question is like, what do you consider a
serious case. In the case of a DUI or shoplifting as in Ms.
Gorman, those would be considered serious cases. I am glad you
actually did that. I am glad you disagree with the Ranking
Member.
Ms. Gorman, did you watch any of President Trump's State of
the Union speech? Did you watch any of President Trump's State
of the Union speech?
Ms. Gorman. Yes.
Mr. Fry. When the President asked, I am going to paraphrase
loosely, that ``it is the duty of public servants in Congress
to protect the safety and security of American citizens.'' Do
you remember that moment?
Ms. Gorman. Yes.
Mr. Fry. What happened at that moment?
Ms. Gorman. I am sorry, say it again.
Mr. Fry. What happened at that moment?
Ms. Gorman. They booed and acted up.
Mr. Fry. Did anyone stand?
Ms. Gorman. No one, the Democrats didn't respond.
Mr. Fry. I don't know if your microphone is on or not.
Ms. Gorman. Oh. They didn't respond.
Mr. Fry. They didn't respond. What did you think? What did
you feel at that moment?
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Fry. Could she answer?
Ms. Gorman. How did I feel? I felt outraged. Outrage that
our politicians who we choose, don't choose us in return. That
is how I felt.
Mr. Fry. Thank you.
Ms. Gorman. I feel outraged that this guy who, yes, he
might have only committed a misdemeanor, but he murdered my
daughter. He was on the streets to murder my daughter, 100
percent preventable. He could have been scooped up twice and he
wasn't. He was allowed to murder my daughter.
Mr. Fry. He should have never been here. Thank you for
that. Mr. Chair, I yield back.
Mr. McClintock. Thank you. Mr. Hunt?
Mr. Hunt. Sheridan Gorman, Katie Abraham, Chloe Polzin,
Jocelyn Nungaray, Rachel Morin, Megan Bos, Lizbeth Medina,
DaCara Thompson, and many more. Say their names.
Say their names. Sheridan, Katie, Chloe, Lincoln, Jocelyn,
Rachel, Megan, Lizbeth, and DaCara. May you rest in peace.
These are Americans. These are people's children. It is
their family members, their friends. Every single one of the
names that I just mentioned deserve the chance to pursue the
American dream.
Every last one of them deserves to grow up and build a
future and live in a country that is safe, secure, and governed
simply by the rule of law. The rule of law that I fought in
combat to fight for every single American.
Instead, these stories end in tragedy. These tragedies were
preventable. When Democrat leaders refuse to cooperate with
Federal immigration enforcement, Americans bear the deadly
consequences.
I am disgusted by my colleagues that fight so hard for the
rights of people that have no business being here in the first
place.
This should not be a political debate. We are talking about
real people and real families whose lives cannot be replaced
ever again.
Entering the United States illegally does not create a
right to remain here indefinitely. For whatever reason, this is
a political football. It is very cut and dry.
This is very simple for someone like me. Let's consider
this, this has already been stated. In just 10 months, New York
released nearly 7,000 aliens subject to ICE detainers.
We are talking about crimes that include 29 murders, 2,500
assaults, 200 burglaries, 300 robberies, and hundreds of sexual
assaults. We are allowing these criminals and these animals
back into our midst.
Government's first responsibility is to protect our
citizens. Anything less than that is a derelict of duty and a
failure of leadership. In this case, the intentional failure of
leadership is done for political purposes.
Our Chair was speaking earlier during his opening remarks
talking about 10 million people that have entered this country
illegally that we know of. I have heard 15, I have heard 20. I
don't give a damn how many it is. It is one too many.
Especially people that come here and rape and maim our
babies. This is why I get up and do this job every single day,
because I have babies too.
I see these pictures that are in front of me and I weep for
you, because I see my babies in these photos. That could have
been one of mine as well.
If we don't do our jobs up here on Capitol Hill, we are
going to have more pictures. We are going to have more murders,
and we are going to have more rapes. This is the bottom line.
This is not a partisan issue. Ms. Gorman, Mr. Abraham, I
want to thank you so much for being here. I want to offer you
my deepest condolences. Thank you so much for being here.
Ma'am, I know this has to be very difficult. You are doing
it in the name of your baby. She is looking down on you and she
is very, very proud of you for doing this. I can assure you.
Sheriff, thank you very much for being here as well. Last
year, sir, you did a Fox News interview in which you mentioned
that under the direction of Gavin Newsome, you received a
threatening letter from the Attorney General of California,
because of your pledge to work with law enforcement. Is this
true, sir?
Sheriff Redman. Yes, sir. It is.
Mr. Hunt. With my remaining time, sir, what would be your
message to Governor Gavin Newsome and Democrat leaders across
this country, who persist with these homicidal sanctuary
policies?
Sheriff, do you think that it is normal for the Governor
and Attorney General of a State to tell a member of law
enforcement to not cooperate with law enforcement?
Sheriff Redman. No, I do not. It puts me in a very hard
position. Once again, I will continue to do what I believe is
right. My message is really clear, in California, stop
championing the criminals and let's start championing the
victims, sir.
Mr. Hunt. Amen. We are killing each other from within. That
is how this country comes to an end, not from anybody from the
outside.
Because we allow 10 million people to enter our country
illegally, and then we make excuses for them after they murder
our babies. That is insanity.
No other country operates like that. Neither should we. I
yield back the remainder of my time. Thank you all so much, and
I offer you my deepest condolences. Thank you all.
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman's time has expired. Mr.
Grothman?
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. First, I want to clean up some of
the things that have been said here in the past.
When people talk about the number of crimes committed who
are people, by people in this country illegally and people
claim that they are more law abiding than the Native born here.
The reason they can make that statement is nobody keeps track
of the number of crimes who are committed by people here
illegally.
Right, if I walk into a Wisconsin jail and ask the sheriff
how many of these people are illegal immigrants? He has no
clue.
We have got a Federal prison in Wisconsin, and I have
toured the Fderal prison, and I ask the warden of the Federal
prison, how many of these people here in this prison are people
who are illegal? He has no idea.
Whenever you hear a politician say that people who are here
illegally are committing less crimes than the native born, they
don't have a clue.
The second thing I want to point out is, because they are
lost in the debate, the huge number of people who come here
legally every year. They try to set those of us up who want the
current law enforced as being some mean people who won't let
anybody in here.
Right now, on a rolling average every year, we have about
800,000 new people sworn in as new citizens. Eight hundred
thousand.
If you look at that historically, it is high. When I was a
child, that number was around 200,000. We are right now letting
in, legally, a very high number.
Right now, in this country, one-sixth of the people are
foreign-born. We have never had so many people in our country
foreign born as we do now.
That is more than even in the late 1800s when we had all
the immigration from Eastern Europe, and Germany, and what have
you. For whatever reason, they don't talk about that.
Now, if we do believe in immigration laws, we should remove
the people who tried to sneak in here illegally. That to me is
also obvious.
In so far, as nobody knows exactly how many and so far as
President Biden let eight million people in this country
illegally, if we are going to have our laws mean anything, it
means ICE, and Border Patrol, and whoever should remove those
eight million people.
I don't know any serious person who believes we should only
remove people who have committed a serious crime. Right? If
eight million people came here illegally, eight million people
should be removed.
Now, we have had a long hearing here, and we are having
this hearing because of the horrific acts committed by people
who are in this country illegally. Sometimes it is easy to
forget the wonderful people whose lives were cut short by the
zeal of what I think is the Democrat Party trying to change
America as quickly as they can and letting everybody under the
sun come here.
In any event, we will start with Mr. Abraham. Do you want
to share with us a little bit of your daughter's history, and
what her dreams were, so that whoever is listening today can
see what life was cut short because of letting all these people
in our country illegally?
Mr. Abraham. Yes. Katie was a special person for sure. She
had this unique personality, drew everyone in and always made
people feel seen and heard.
I actually want to ask questions. Actually, Ms. Pierce, and
then the Congresswoman who kind of stepped away scowling, the
inconsistencies I am struggling with here.
They are complaining about children being exploited. I
didn't hear these voices from 2021-2025. Were you talking about
that too? Because maybe I wasn't paying attention.
As wonderful as Katie was and how she got sacrificed by
awful policies, she was sacrificed, there is no question about
it. People knew a preventable outcome.
This is part of the equation and calculation. OK? This is
100 percent, I believe. It just seems to me strike the
inconsistencies that, oh, we are so worried about now, I don't
know.
Over the last four years, nothing, not a word from anybody.
I am just confused, I guess. I don't want to talk about it,
because I don't think anyone here cares.
I don't want to waste my breath on that. I just want to
know why the inconsistency? Why does it only one side and the
other?
That is what I would like to know. We will talk after this.
I would love to hear how you are saying now is important, but
back then it wasn't important, anyway.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. It comes from there, just people
want to dramatically change this country. They will go through,
ignore any ounce of commonsense to change America.
Ms. Gorman, would you like to tell us at all about your
daughter's future?
Mr. McClintock. I am afraid I am going to have to
interrupt. We are going to have to save that for the next
question, because the gentleman's time has expired. We will go
to Chair Jordan.
Mr. Jordan. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Let me start with, well,
let me go back to Mr. Abraham. Your daughter went to school in
Ohio, is that right?
Did I? When we talked in our office a couple months ago.
Mr. Abraham. Yes, it was Ohio. Ohio University Bobcat.
Mr. Jordan. Yes. Yes. What was she majoring in?
Mr. Abraham. She was going to be in marketing. Yes.
Mr. Jordan. We got a big journalism school there. I
wondered if she was going to be a journalist. Well, I know she
was a lovely young lady. Sheriff, your State is a sanctuary
State, is that right?
Sheriff Redman. Correct, sir.
Mr. Jordan. Yes. Even if you wanted to enter into these
287G agreements that Ms. Pierce was kind of alluding to, where
you can work with the Federal Government in enforcing Federal
law relative to immigration, you are not allowed to do that in
your State, is that right?
Sheriff Redman. Correct, sir.
Mr. Jordan. You decided you are going to do the right
thing.
Sheriff Redman. Yes.
Mr. Jordan. You are going to work with them, right?
Sheriff Redman. Yes.
Mr. Jordan. Guess what? If we had passed the Bill that Mr.
McClintock is the sponsor of, that we have already passed out
of this Committee, you would be protected.
It says you couldn't face any kind of repercussions or
consequences from the State if you would, if that law would be
passed. Right now, you are just doing it because it is the
right darn thing to do. Is it really that hard?
Ms. Pierce said it is tough to do. It is a cost on
counties. It is basically honoring the detainer notice.
My understanding of what, well, I have seen these notices.
It is like, hey, if you are going to release so-and-so, who we
know is an illegal migrant, who was in your detention center or
your jail, because it has been alleged he has committed some
other crime, if you are going to release him, just call us.
Give us a heads up 48 hours before you release him. How is that
an additional cost for the county or the city?
Sheriff Redman. There is no cost. In fact, that is probably
the most efficient way. What I have been hearing is, the
Federal resources have now been reallocated, and it is all
because of sanctuary laws.
Instead of going to the jails where it is extremely
efficient, now they have to go out into the community, which is
not safer.
Mr. Jordan. Jeopardizing the safety of law enforcement,
jeopardizing the safety of the public. Maybe just as
importantly, jeopardizing the safety of the migrant, right?
Sheriff Redman. One hundred percent, sir.
Mr. Jordan. Yes. That is why I used the word dumb three
times in my opening statement, because I have yet to figure out
anything smart about this policy that is now, as I said, in
almost a third of the Nation lives in a jurisdiction where that
is the policy. That is just crazy.
Ms. Gorman, I know it is not easy to talk about, but the
individual who took your daughter's life, Jose Medina, do you
know when he was apprehended by border patrol?
Ms. Gorman. May 9, 2023.
Mr. Jordan. May 9, 2023, during the Biden Administration.
When they were letting in 10 million people.
Mr. Abraham, when was your, the guy who took the life of
your precious daughter, when was he apprehended?
Mr. Abraham. He reentered easily 2022, using false
documents and aliases.
Mr. Jordan. In 2022, during the Biden Administration. They
let in 10 million people, right? Just let them in.
OK. Do you know what, do you know, Ms. Gorman, what Mr.
Medina happened to say at his interview when he was, he was
apprehended by Border Patrol. You know what he happened to say
at his interview?
Ms. Gorman. Yes, sir. As I understand it, he said he was
not claiming--
Mr. Jordan. Put your microphone, if you would, please.
Thank you.
Ms. Gorman. As I understand it, he was asked the standard
questions, of whether he was claiming asylum and whether he
felt threatened or scared to return to his country. He was in
Columbia at the time.
He answered negatively. No, he was not afraid. No, he was
not claiming asylum. We took him anyway. That is my
understanding.
Mr. Jordan. He gets asked the question, is there a credible
fear of persecution or harm in your country? His answer was no.
Ms. Gorman. No.
Mr. Jordan. I just want to come to the U.S., because it is
great, best country ever. He just wanted to come here.
The agents and people who were doing the interview said,
``he is likely to not show up.'' He is likely to abscond,
right?
Ms. Gorman. Yep.
Mr. Jordan. OK.
Ms. Gorman. Yet, they gave him cashless bail after he
committed a crime in Chicago.
Mr. Jordan. After that crime too. I am getting to that. He
gets charged a few months later, or sometime later he gets
charged with a crime, right? Did it. They released him. They
don't call.
Ms. Gorman. Nope.
Mr. Jordan. They don't have an 287G, because Chicago and
Illinois are sanctuary cities and sanctuary State. He gets
charged with the crime, and he gets released. Does he show up
for his court date?
Ms. Gorman. Of course not.
Mr. Jordan. Of course not. Did local authorities ever once
think of calling ICE?
Ms. Gorman. No.
Mr. Jordan. No. They didn't have a sheriff like the guy
sitting beside you, like Sheriff Redman. They didn't have that.
Then, this terrible thing happens. That is what we are trying
to change.
Ms. Gorman. Yes.
Mr. Jordan. I don't think, to me, I don't get it either,
because it sure doesn't seem that hard to me. It seems like--
Ms. Gorman. Commonsense.
Mr. Jordan. There you said it. Commonsense. I actually
think, I am going to get really political here, but I actually
think this midterm election is really, I said this in an
interview the other day.
You could summarize it in two sentences. They are crazy. We
are not. Right? Because this policy is crazy. It is crazy
versus commonsense as the President said.
This is the most commonsense thing. Just work, let the
sheriff work with you. He wants to work with you in California,
let him do it. Not being maybe violating the law for doing the
commonsense thing for goodness sake. I want to again, thank you
all for coming.
Mr. Nadler. Would the gentleman yield?
Mr. Jordan. I will yield the four-seconds to the right
and--
Mr. Nadler. I want to say I agree with you.
Mr. Jordan. Well, God bless you.
Mr. Nadler. One is crazy and one isn't. The only question--
Mr. Jordan. You figured it out on your way out the door,
Mr. Nadler. That is great to know.
Mr. Nadler. The only question is which way?
Mr. Jordan. All right. I yield back. I want to do this
again if I could, Mr. Chair. I want to thank the Chair of this
Subcommittee. He is the sponsor of the Bill that fixes it.
He has been working on this issue, and so many others that
are commonsense things we need to do to make it work.
Mr. McClintock. I hate to interrupt the Chair. His time,
especially on that subject, but his time has expired. Mr.
Onder.
Mr. Onder. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you to all the
witnesses for being here today. It is utterly devastating to
think of the damage that has been done in America's largest
cities today, because of the embrace of sanctuary city
policies.
Ms. Gorman, Mr. Abraham, I am so deeply sorry for the loss
of your daughters. I commend you for your courage in being here
today, and bearing witness to the insanity, the almost sadistic
cruelty represented by the politically and ideologically driven
sanctuary policies of these jurisdictions that one-third of
Americans are forced to live in today. Thank you. Thank you for
being here.
Sanctuary policies create a safe haven for criminal illegal
aliens. They embolden repeat offenders and they make our
communities less safe.
Americans all over the country are subject to senseless
violence. When State governments like Illinois refuse to honor
ICE detainers, and criminal illegal aliens are released into
the public without repercussions, there are consequences.
For example, even after the horrific sexual assault of a
three-year-old girl by an illegal alien whose ICE detainer was
ignored by the Chicago Police Department, the Chicago PD's only
response was, ``They remain committed to protecting all Chicago
residents, regardless of their immigration status.''
Tell me that the governing class in Chicago cares about
Americans. They are putting illegal aliens first and American
citizens last.
In Missouri in 2008, we had the foresight to ban sanctuary
cities. Actually, we passed a piece of legislation called House
Bill 1549. It was my Bill; it was at the time probably the
strongest State law in the country to fight illegal
immigration.
We banned sanctuary cities. We have a lot of crazy Left
Democrat politicians in St. Louis, Columbia, Kansas City,
Springfield in Missouri, but we don't have any sanctuary cities
because of our foresight to get ahead of this.
Back when folks said you are just being an alarmist, you
are racist, or you are xenophobic. Actually, I am happy to say,
quite a few of my Democrat colleagues back then joined me in
supporting that Bill, because it just represented commonsense.
We cannot treat our immigration laws with the contempt that
we are seeing out of sanctuary jurisdictions in this country
today. I just wanted to ask you, Ms. Gorman, if you had ever an
opinion on this, what policy changes do you hope to see so that
other families aren't subjected to the pain and just the misery
that you have been?
Ms. Gorman. I really am not educated on the specific
policies. I have been reading a lot about them. Obviously, the
sanctuary policies that they have, combined with cashless bail,
combined with failure to follow actual Federal law that is
already in place. I don't know that there really needs to be
much that is changed. As long as you follow the Federal law,
then--
Mr. Onder. Yes. You are not a lawyer. You are not a
criminologist. You are not a subject matter expert. This is
just--
Ms. Gorman. If they had followed the Federal law, my
daughter would be sitting next to me right now.
Mr. Onder. Yes.
Ms. Gorman. I would be on a beach somewhere, not sitting
here.
Mr. Onder. If any of my Democrat colleagues have troubles
with that law, there is a place you can go, it is called a
legislature, specifically Congress, where you can change laws
that have been on the books since at least 1965. You can change
those laws.
Instead, we are going to take it on ourselves and our
sanctuary jurisdictions to be like John C. Calhoun. We are just
going to nullify Federal law. We are just not going to
cooperate with law enforcement.
Mr. Abraham, what are your thoughts?
Mr. Abraham. Yes, I agree. First, you can't nullify Federal
law and then have no process to fill the vacuum.
Mr. Onder. Yes.
Mr. Abraham. You want 10 million illegals apparently or
whatever it is, or just 10 million immigrants, do it the proper
way. Do it the way my parents did.
Mr. Onder. Yes.
Mr. Abraham. I learned on their knee, right?
Mr. Onder. Yes.
Mr. Abraham. What happened in the prior Administration,
that crazy unprecedented recklessness, and now you are
objecting to correcting some of the past?
Mr. Onder. Absolutely not.
Mr. Abraham. It is just so dishonest.
Mr. Onder. Absolutely.
Mr. Abraham. I am not even sure what to say with that.
Mr. Onder. I do want to echo the sentiments of my
colleague, Representative Grothman. The United States of
America has nothing to apologize for regarding our immigration
policies.
We let millions of legal foreigners into our country. We
give some of them green cards, we naturalize some of them who
do it legally.
It is not fair for all those around the world who are
waiting to do it the right way, that some get to jump the line.
Some of those are criminals who victimize our families.
Mr. Abraham. Our job, your jobs are not to incentivize,
entice, and bring people like you saw at that Southern, was
that compassionate? Was that compassion?
Mr. Onder. Of course.
Mr. Abraham. I saw those. That wasn't compassion.
Mr. Onder. Of course it wasn't.
Mr. Abraham. It is not our job to do that.
Mr. Onder. Thank you.
Mr. McClintock. The Ranking Member wants to remind you
that--
Mr. Abraham. We did not see a good environment.
Mr. McClintock. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. Onder. Thank you for that.
Mr. McClintock. For my time, Mr. Abraham, go ahead. Finish
answering your question on my time.
Mr. Abraham. I would just say that the job and the role of
this country is not to entice and go out and pull in, right?
Create the best country you can. People will come; you have
a process. They say about, well, citizens create more crime
than illegal immigrants. Even if this is true--
Mr. McClintock. It is not.
Mr. Abraham. As human nature, then you ought to assume the
similar type of percentage will create havoc here. Filter them
out.
Mr. McClintock. Mr. Abraham, by the way, that is not true.
Mr. Abraham. I agree. It is not true.
Mr. McClintock. We have had a lot of testimony to that
extent.
Mr. Abraham. I agree. It is distorted.
Ms. Gorman. We are not allowed to know that information and
track it.
Mr. McClintock. The illegal alien population commits crimes
at a higher rate than the general population. We see that in
the SCAAP numbers, for example.
One way they hide these numbers is by simply refusing to
report illegal alien crimes.
Mr. Abraham. Exactly. Illinois doesn't, and they will never
figure it out.
Mr. McClintock. I do need to set the record straight on
claims we heard from Ms. Pierce and Ms. Scanlon.
The fact is, of the aliens arrested by ICE during President
Trump's first year of the second term, 70 percent had a
conviction or pending criminal charges.
That doesn't include the number of aliens who have criminal
histories in their home countries but not in the U.S., or
aliens without criminal histories but who are gang members or
terrorists. That is one of the games they play.
I would like to ask unanimous consent to enter into the
record an article entitled ``Seven in 10 ICE arrests under
Trump have criminal histories,'' from the Washington Examiner,
December 26, 2025.
Mr. McClintock. Without objection. Sheriff Redmond, we hear
several arguments from the Democrats in defense of so-called
sanctuary laws. The first one you have already addressed, the
question of resources.
Let me ask you another question in that respect. What is
more taxing to local-law enforcement, turning an illegal alien
over to ICE while they are in your custody?
Having ICE to send squads into the community to arrest that
same alien because you are forbidden under sanctuary laws from
reporting that alien to ICE?
Sheriff Redman. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Obviously, sending in
ICE into my community poses some significant issues and
problems when we are not allowed to cooperate and be there.
There are interoperability issues. The fact that we know
our community, we know the players, and we know the
neighborhood. If something goes down, then we are not involved,
that is not safe for my community. The locals should be
involved.
Mr. McClintock. Without those sanctuary laws, you could
turn that individual who is already safely in custody over to
ICE without any of those problems, correct?
Sheriff Redman. Correct. Correct, absolutely. With those
low-level offenses.
Mr. McClintock. Yet, the Democrats keep telling us about
the terrible consequences of having, to send ICE squads to
arrest illegal aliens who could have been turned over while in
custody, but under their laws, law enforcement was forbidden
from doing so.
Another argument we hear is that honoring ICE detainers
would discourage illegal aliens from reporting crimes. What is
your response?
Sheriff Redman. My response is, I met with our local
migrants in my community. We are a rural county with a huge
winery.
They had a litany of questions for me. I sat down and
talked to their representative, and after our conversation,
they want to feel safe. They want to be safe. They do trust law
enforcement. They do not want criminals because of these
migrants--
Mr. McClintock. In fact, they are the first victims of
these criminal illegal aliens--
Sheriff Redman. Correct, right.
Mr. McClintock. That the Democrats are requiring be allowed
back into our communities. Is that not the case?
Sheriff Redman. Correct. The illegals will prey on their
own people, because they know that they don't want to say
anything.
Mr. McClintock. Another one is that, well, a Federal
judicial warrant should be required. How do you obtain a
Federal judicial warrant for a State crime or for a civil
deportation?
Sheriff Redman. You can't.
Mr. McClintock. We have had testimony on that from other
witnesses as well. You can't. That is another one of the games
they play. They know that. They use that as an excuse not to
enforce the law.
Sheridan's murderer was in custody for shoplifting. Under
SB 54, California Sanctuary Law, is that considered a low-level
crime that forbids you from honoring an ICE detainer,
shoplifting?
Sheriff Redman. Yes, sir.
Mr. McClintock. What other crimes are required by law to
keep secret from the public and from ICE? Burglary?
Sheriff Redman. Yes.
Mr. McClintock. DUI?
Sheriff Redman. Yes.
Mr. McClintock. Welfare fraud?
Sheriff Redman. Yes.
Mr. McClintock. Yet, Ms. Pierce tells us these are not
serious crimes. Another one of the games that they play.
Could you just walk us through, very quickly, how you would
honor an ICE detainer if you had the legal authority from the
State of California to do so?
You would get a request from ICE to notify them when an
illegal alien is about to be released from custody. Is that
correct?
Sheriff Redman. That is correct.
Mr. McClintock. You got a written legal detainer request?
Sheriff Redman. Correct.
Mr. McClintock. What would you do in response to that
request?
Sheriff Redman. If we were able to contact ICE, we would
immediately notify them and let them know this person is--
Mr. McClintock. You would pick up the phone and call them
and say, ``We are about to release this individual unless you
want to come pick them up?''
Sheriff Redman. Yes, sir.
Mr. McClintock. Does that represent a serious drain on
county resources?
Sheriff Redman. Not at all. We do it all the time.
Mr. McClintock. Is that worth the life--
Ms. Gorman. Of my daughter?
Mr. McClintock. Of Sheridan Gorman? Many of the other angel
families that we have here? Or Katie Abraham?
Sheriff Redman. One hundred percent.
Mr. McClintock. That is what they are saying, is it is not
worth a phone call.
Well, my time has expired. That concludes today's hearing,
I believe. I want to thank our witnesses for appearing before
the Subcommittee today.
Without objection, all members will have five legislative
days to submit additional written questions for the witnesses
or additional materials for the record.
With that and without objection, the hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 5:20 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
All materials submitted for the record by the Members of
the Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and
Enforce-
ment can be found at the following links: https://
docs.house.gov/Committee/Calendar/ByEvent.aspx?EventID=119421.
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