Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) on Monday said Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen should step down due to her record of making "misleading statements" about the Trump administration's "zero tolerance" policy that separates children from their parents at the border.
On Sunday, Nielsen tweeted that the administration does "not have a policy of separating families at the border. Period." Harris said that for more than a year, she's been asking for "complete data on the number of children separated and what training and protocol exists for carrying out such separations. In response, the leadership of the department has routinely failed to provide complete answers to questions from me and my colleagues." The Department of Homeland Security "should have a commitment to transparency and accountability," Harris continued, but under Nielsen, it "has a track record of neither."
It's not just the border crisis that's an issue, Harris said; she also cited Nielsen's "failed response" to the destruction caused by Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico last year. Several other Democrats, including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) and Rep. Ted Lieu (Calif.), have also called on Nielsen to resign.