Head of ICE Admits to Senator Hassan at Senate Hearing that DHS Leadership Statements “Bias” Ongoing Investigations into Good/Pretti Deaths

Click Here to Watch Senator Hassan's Full Exchange at Today's Hearing

WASHINGTON - At a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Hearing today, U.S. Senator Maggie Hassan (D-NH) pressed the head of the U.S Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Todd Lyons, on the unacceptable lawlessness of ICE agents in cities across the country that is making communities less safe. Under questioning from Senator Hassan, the head of ICE admitted that recent comments from the Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem and White House Homeland Security Advisor Steven Miller "put a bias" onto the ongoing investigations into the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti.

During a key exchange, Senator Hassan pressed Director Lyons on comments Secretary Noem and Stephen Miller made in the immediate aftermaths of the shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. "Your testimony doesn't make any sense. If it would impede or bias the investigations for you to say right now - when you know a lot more than we did right after the shootings - whether Renee Good or Alex Pretti were domestic terrorists...then why wouldn't it impede or bias the investigations for Secretary Noem and Stephen Miller to say the same thing about the same people?"

In response, Director Lyons admitted that "any comments that are made publicly, privately, text, email, or Instagram posts, whatever, is going to put a bias" on the investigation - saying, in essence, that Secretary Noem and Stephen Miller's characterizations of Renee Good and Alex Pretti as a domestic terrorists biased the ongoing investigations into their deaths.

"We're here today because Americans are outraged by the deliberate intimidation, trampling of civil rights, and lawlessness from this administration that has left two Americans shot dead - two American citizens shot dead - by masked federal agents," said Senator Hassan at the start of the hearing. "Immigration enforcement needs to combine strong border security with a targeted, focused effort on removing violent criminals. Instead, this administration's divisive, dangerous, and deadly actions are making our communities less safe."

Additionally, at the hearing, Senator Hassan pushed ICE leadership to work with local leaders in Merrimack and address their concerns about a proposed ICE facility in the town, which the Department of Homeland Security has thus far refused to do.

Senator Hassan has called on Congress to work on a bipartisan basis to act to both keep important government services funded - including FEMA and TSA workers and Coast Guard servicemembers paid - while also enacting common-sense protections for the basic civil rights of Americans against the recent lawless behavior by ICE.

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