You may have thought it was President-elect Donald Trump sitting down to talk with local law enforcement officers at a border security roundtable in McAllen, Texas on Friday. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) took a page out of Trump's rhetorical playbook after the roundtable discussion, slamming the Obama White House for continuing to release "murderers" and "rapists."
"This administration, for eight years, has persisted in releasing criminal illegal aliens," he told local news media. "Every year, they release murderers, they release rapists. They release burglars and people who have committed violent crimes. And that has got to change."
Of course, Cruz is not being hyperbolic. Too many stories exist of Americans being killed by dangerous illegal immigrants. One of the more talked about tragedies was that of Kate Steinle, a young woman who was killed last summer in the sanctuary city of San Francisco by an illegal immigrant who had been previously deported.
"The situation requires more border patrol agents and better technology to catch illegal immigrants," Cruz said.
House Homeland Security Chairman Michael McCaul offered the same antidote this week, while also promising that a wall will be built and that Mexico will be expected to pay for it.
Even with the crime and drugs, some immigration proponents still try to argue that the real victims are the criminal aliens.
"We need to make sure that we don't forget the human aspect of it," Sister Norma Pimentel, Catholic Charities said. "And the importance that, they're people and many of them are victims in all of this."