Washington As part of President Donald Trump’s ongoing high-profile immigration crackdown, the Trump administration on Tuesday flew the first flight of detained migrants aboard military aircraft from the United States to the naval facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Kristi Noe, the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, released images of men in chains and handcuffs on social media, accompanied by immigration officers wearing tactical military uniforms.
“The worst of the worst will be found in Guantanamo Bay,” Noem wrote. Today is the first day of that.
Last week, Trump declared that he would order the Defense Department to hold up to 30,000 individuals without U.S. legal status in the base’s migrant detention center. It would almost treble the approximately 41,500 beds that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement now has funds for nationwide.
According to a news release from the U.S. Southern Command Public Affairs Offices, more than 150 U.S. Marines and U.S. Army personnel began arriving at the post over the weekend.The base now has over 300 military soldiers stationed there.
In the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, the base gained notoriety for housing individuals charged with terrorism. Proponents have called for the base’s closure, pointing to human rights abuses.
During a Fox Business interview on Tuesday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt also verified that flights were happening.
She added that the president is not playing around and that the first aircraft carrying illegal migrants from the United States to Guantanamo Bay are already in motion.
When asked if women, children, and families will be held at Guantanamo Bay during a Sunday appearance with NBC’s Meet the Press, Noem refused to respond.
As Noem stated in the interview, “If you look at what we are doing today, we’ve been very clear on that of targeting the worst of the worst.” Targeting criminal aliens who are increasing the danger on our streets is this president’s top concern.
Although Guantanamo Bay has been used to hold migrants in the past, it was mostly used to apprehend refugees escaping from Cuba and Haiti in the 1990s; it was not utilized to transport individuals from within the United States.
When States Newsroom asked the Department of Homeland Security where the aircraft left from, how many detained migrants were on board the C-17 military jet, and whether they had a criminal status, the agency did not reply.
