60 Minutes PROVES Trump Is Lying About Deported Migrants Being Criminals

The Trump administration has maintained that the people they’ve deported to the El Salvadorian prison were all violent criminals that were so dangerous that they had to be sent away immediately. But a 60 Minutes investigation found that at least 75% of the people deported have NO criminal records, completely blowing up the talking points of the administration. Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins explains what’s happening.

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*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

On Sunday evening, 60 Minutes, decided to do a deep dive into the 238 people that the Trump administration has rounded up from here in the United States and sent down to that prison in El Salvador, the Sea Cot, it's called C-E-C-O-T. It has been described as a torture prison. People have called it a slave prison. Uh, one of the most horrific super prisons on the planet, basically. And 238 people from the United States, including some people, totally innocent, regular green card holding people were sent down there. But the Trump administration maintains that aside from the one guy they totally messed up on, but refused to bring back. Uh, everybody else was a horrible criminal. Like just the worst of the worst were getting rid of the gang members and the murderers. So 60 Minutes realized, you know what, if these people actually have these criminal records, like the Trump administration has given us the names, how about we do a simple search and see how many have criminal records?

And it turns out, based on their investigation, 75% of these people, 75%, had no criminal record at all. Nothing in their history of any kind of law breaking 3%, they were unable to determine. Out of the 238 people, 12 of them, 12 had criminal records, prosecutions or arrests for violent crimes, murders, assaults, things like that. Just 12 of the 238 that we were told were all violent criminals. 12 of them were or at least accused of being, 75%. No, 22% did have criminal records, but it was for nonviolent crimes, uh, vandalism, shoplifting, things like that. But we were told 100% of these were the worst of the worst, and that's why we're sending them down to the prison for terrorists.

The administration has been lying since day one, but their lies continue to evolve because if you look at the 75% that they have no criminal record, the administration has a response for that. A Homeland Security spokesperson said quote, many of the individuals that are counted as non-criminals are actually terrorists. Human rights, abusers, gangsters more. They, they just don't have a rap sheet in the us. Furthermore, every single one of these individuals committed a crime when they came into this country illegally. It is not an accurate description to say they are non-criminals. This deceptive categorization is devoid of reality and misleads, the American public

Entering the country illegally or overstaying a visa is not a criminal matter here in the United States. So no, they are not criminal. That is in fact a civil matter that is handled in civil courts, not criminal courts. So no, even by your own exaggerated definition, it still doesn't apply to these people because it's not a criminal matter, it's a civil matter, but that's what they've done. They continue to move the goalposts. This isn't the first time they've made that claim. Caroline Levitt has said like, well, everybody in the country illegally is technically a criminal, so therefore they all fit our description. They made the description first and came up with the criteria later to include everyone. Even though legally speaking in the United States, it is completely inaccurate. It's no surprise that Donald Trump is now losing support on the issue of immigration. And as more and more stories come out about how innocent these people really are with no due process, his numbers are gonna continue to go down. You already have a majority of Americans who disapprove of sending people down to that El Salvadorian prison, and that happened before we actually learned that an innocent man was sent down there. Just imagine what those polls are gonna look like by the end of this week or next week. It's the one issue Donald Trump still has approval on overall with immigration.