Department of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly took partial blame Tuesday for the confusion that ensued after President Donald Trump issued an executive order temporarily barring travel from seven countries as well as the inflow of refugees.
Kelly expressed regret that members of Congress were not properly apprised of the order before it took effect and admitted that the rollout should have been slowed.
“In retrospect, I should have—this is all on me, by the way—I should have delayed it just a bit so that I could talk to members of Congress, particularly to the leadership of committees like this, to prepare them for what was coming,” he told the House Homeland Security Committee.
“Lesson learned on me,” he later said. “I should have slowed it down by a day, maybe two. Probably would not have put it out exactly on a Friday the way we did.”
The administration wanted to get the order out quickly, he added.
“The thinking was to get it out quick so that potentially people that might be coming here to harm us would not take advantage of some period of time that they could jump on an airplane and get here, or get here in other ways,” Kelly said.
The order temporarily bars travel from Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Iran, Iraq and Yemen for 90 days. It also bars refugee admission from Syria and pauses refugee admission from other countries for 120 days.
Several news organizations reported that Kelly was not fully briefed on the order until the day it was issued two Fridays ago. White House spokespersons would neither confirm nor deny the reports last week.
Kelly elaborated to the committee about his advance knowledge of the order:
