House Democrat Jim Himez (Connecticut) said he believes the Trump administration is acting “with a cocktail of incredible incompetence and illegality.”
Himes, a ranking member of the House Committee on Intelligence Report, joined CBS News' Face the Nation on Sunday, with host Margaret Brennan asking about the deportation flight of Venezuelan gang members in the Trump administration and the different messages regarding Trump's use of alien enemies.
“What people are concerned about is that this administration will act with a cocktail of incredible incompetence and illegality,” Himes said of the Department of Deportation and the Ministry of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
“When you take care of our nuclear weapons and then fire all the people in the Department of Energy who say, 'oopsie, we need to hire you,' it's incompetent,” he continued.
Brennan asked for his declarations about the deportation of Tren de Aragua (TDA) members and the use of Trump's alien enemies.
18th– Wartime laws of the century allow governments to deport those considered foreign enemies at war. Officials note that the US has not been in a war with Venezuela, but national security adviser Mike Waltz suggested that the gang is partnering with the Venezuelan government.
“I'm not a lawyer, but I can read the first paragraph of the alien enemy law, which very clearly states that the authority this administration is claiming is dependent on the declaration of war rather than acting as a proxy,” Himes said. “So Mike distorted the law.”
Himes and Brennan highlighted a recent New York Times article in which the intelligence reporting agency stated they did not believe the gangs were linked to the Venezuelan government.
