Mullin bashes Maria Elvira Salazar’s pro-immigration amnesty GOP ad: ‘A criminal is a criminal’

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin is not bothered by Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar’s (R-FL) campaign advertisement against aggressive immigration enforcement because his department is focused on catching and deporting illegal immigrants.In the 30-second ad released Thursday, the pro-immigration Republican lawmaker declared the administration’s “immigration enforcement efforts have gone too far” and argued that Hispanic voters who backed President Donald Trump in 2024 “feel betrayed today” by his hard-line stance on immigration.Salazar cited the Department of Homeland Security’s own data showing that 50% of the 50,000 people detained in July had no criminal convictions or pending charges. The DHS chief maintained that the point was false or, at least, misrepresented. “I’ll say that’s actually not true,” Mullin said on CNN’s Inside Politics with Dana Bash on Friday. “Every one of them was criminals because they broke our nation’s laws when they came across our borders illegally.”“What level of criminal activity are you willing to accept? We are tasked with enforcing the nation’s laws,” he added. “I can’t repeat this enough. We don’t pick and choose. The Congress is the one who set those laws. We are enforcing them. And when you broke the law, and you came to this country illegally, you chose to become a criminal at that point. Regardless if you consider a criminal being a pedophile or not, a criminal is a criminal.”Mullin’s response to Salazar comes as Immigration and Customs Enforcement continues executing the administration’s mass deportation agenda. Unlike the Florida Republican, Trump said ICE operations “haven’t gone far enough” in an interview with CBS News’s 60 Minutes last year.Salazar says she does not support amnesty, a policy that allows illegal immigrants to obtain legal status or permanent residency, but she does support long-term illegal immigrants applying for legal status while supporting tighter border security. Mullin believes anyone who has crossed the border illegally should not be let off the hook.“Every single person that chose to step over our northern or southern border and cut the line of our true immigration policy, they chose to break our nation’s laws,” Mullin said. “Regardless, if it was 20 years ago, 30 years ago, or four years ago, you still chose to break the law.“A political campaign [ad] is a political campaign ad. I completely understand it, but that’s not going to keep us and the men and women at the Department of Homeland Security from doing our job.”Salazar, a U.S. citizen born to Cuban parents, is running for a fourth term in Florida’s 27th Congressional District and will face former CBS News Miami anchor Eliott Rodriguez in the general election. The incumbent easily won her primary last month in a red-leaning district that Trump carried by 14 percentage points in 2024.FLORIDA REPUBLICAN BREAKS WITH TRUMP, SAYS IMMIGRATION POLICY HAS ‘GONE TOO FAR’After watching the ad, Trump said he disagreed with Salazar but noted he is still endorsing her reelection bid.“I’m very strong on the border, and she isn’t,” the president said. “I understand what she’s saying. I won because of my border. Maria won [her race] only because of me. She got a little soft on the border.”