WASHINGTON (AP) – President Donald Trump is patting himself on the back for immigration and job-creation initiatives that started before he took office.
A look at his statements during a news conference Monday with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau:
TRUMP: “We’re actually taking people that are criminals, very, very, hardened criminals in some cases … with a tremendous track record of abuse and problems, and we’re getting them out and that’s what I said I would do … And I said at the beginning, we are going to get the bad ones, the really bad ones, we’re getting them out and that’s exactly what we’re doing.”
THE FACTS: Officials said an operation last week that resulted in the arrest of more than 680 immigrants in various cities was a routine enforcement action like those undertaken during the administration of Barack Obama, who deported an unprecedented number of people as president.
More specifically, David Marin, Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s field office director for enforcement and removal operations in greater Los Angeles, said the agency carries out such large-scale operations two or three times a year in his region. The California operation was in the planning stages “before the administration came out with their current executive orders,” he said. More than 100 of the arrests were in the Los Angeles area.