WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - President Donald Trump has signed an executive order directing the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of Homeland Security to take actions to expand the Migrant Operations Center at Guantanamo Bay to detain 30,000 criminal migrants.
'This memorandum is issued in order to halt the border invasion, dismantle criminal cartels, and restore national sovereignty,' Trump said.
During a media interview Wednesday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the U.S. Naval Station in Cuba is the 'perfect place' to safely detain the migrants. He made clear that detaining migrants wouldn't necessarily require the high level of security used to detain suspected terrorists during Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom.
The Taliban and al-Qaida terrorists are jailed in one part of the Guantanamo Bay detention facilities.
The other part of the installation is a U.S. naval station that has provided migrant and refugee resettlement for several decades.
'This is a temporary transit which is already the mission of Naval Station Guantanamo Bay, where we can plus-up tens of thousands, if necessary, to humanely move illegals out of our country where they do not belong [and] back to the countries where they came from in proper process,' Hegseth said.
Calling the Guantanamo operation a 'plan in movement,' Hegseth also said that the Pentagon is ramping up to expand the scope of deportations.
The new Defense Secretary affirmed the Defense Department's commitment to working with other federal agencies to bolster security at the southern border.
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