The Department of Homeland Security has blocked House Democratic staffers from the Oversight Committee from touring border facilities over “rude” behavior.
The ban, which shuts down a planned trip by staff of committee Chairman Elijah Cummings to visit Customs and Border Protection facilities, were a result of “disruptive” behavior on the last trip, according to Fox News.
“Due to the operational burden placed on the field by their refusal to comply with instruction during last week’s STAFFDEL [staff delegation visit], CBP pulled the trip in which more site visits were to take place at CBP and ICE facilities this week,” a senior DHS official said Wednesday. “DHS communicated to the committee that due to their conduct, CBP could not support visits from the committee this week.”
Cummings’ staff also reportedly “interfered” with operations of law enforcement and were “rude” to officers. The DHS still plans on allowing visits to ICE this week.
Cummings, 68, has held a series of meetings with border officials about conditions on the United States’ southern border. In July, a video of the Maryland Democrat going ballistic at the head of DHS during a hearing went viral after Cummings said the agency could “do better.”
“I get tired of folks saying, ‘Oh, oh, they just beating up on the Border Patrol. Oh, they just beating up on Homeland Security.’ What I am saying, is I want to concentrate on these children. And I want to make sure that they are OK,” Cummings said. “We are the greatest country in the world. We are the ones that can go anywhere in the world and save people, make sure they have diapers, make sure they have toothbrushes, make sure they’re not laying around defecating in some silver paper.”
Last month, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez visited a Border Patrol facility in El Paso, Texas, where witnesses accused her of acting in a “threatening manner” during the tour.
