Political Quotes

“Mr. President, ahead of our votes today, I wanted to echo the concerns that have already been voiced by many of my colleagues in this Chamber regarding the nomination of Alejandro Mayorkas to be the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. At this point, we are all very familiar with his long legacy of service on behalf of people of the United States, so I will just highlight one example of the ``value'' that he will bring to the table should the Senate vote to confirm him. When he served as USCIS Director during the Obama administration, the inspector general was forced to investigate an ``extraordinary'' number of internal allegations that Mayorkas was granting ``special access and special favors'' to wealthy EB-5 ``investor visa'' applicants linked to influential Democrats. When the IG took a closer look at the visa applications for three powerful Chinese nationals in particular, they came to the conclusion that if Mayorkas hadn't intervened, and I am quoting, ``the matter would have been decided differently.'' Now, this is something that we know is inappropriate. We know that this is something for which Mr. Mayorkas should be held accountable. We know that this is something for which he has not been held accountable, and here is what he did: He put his thumb on the scale, pressured his DHS colleagues--pressured his DHS colleagues--to break their own rules and turn the law on its head, all because a few powerful friends asked him to do it.…”