{Ex-marine general says creation of physical obstacles and supporting surveillance technologies key to achieving goal.}
John Kelly, Donald Trump’s pick to lead the department of homeland security, has said tightening the country’s border will be his top priority in his new role.
Speaking before a Senate confirmation hearing on Tuesday, Kelly called for a “layered defence” on the southern border that would include the possible use of drones and sensors.
“A physical barrier in and of itself will not do the job,” Kelly told a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing.
A layered defence, he said, would include better partnerships with some Latin American countries as far south as Peru and border patrol agents, as well as technology such as drones that would work in “places that perhaps the wall can’t be built or will be built any time soon”.
He said such tactics were needed because Trump’s plan to build a wall along the border to stop undocumented immigrants would not be sufficient.
Deportations reached record levels under President Barack Obama, whose administration deported more than 2.5 million people between 2009 and 2015.
A large wall already exists on much of the US-Mexico border.
Earlier on Tuesday, the Senate confirmation hearing for Jeff Sessions, Trump’s pick for attorney general, was marred by interruptions .
Two men wearing costumes of the Klu Klux Klan (KKK), the white supremacist organisation with a history of fatal racist attacks on people of colour, were ejected from the building after they disrupted the hearing.
Civil-liberties advocates seized on Sessions’ voting record and his appearances before groups that espouse anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant views.
He was rejected for a federal judgeship by the Senate Judiciary Committee 30 years ago amid accusations of racism.
Separately, John Kerry, the outgoing US secretary of state, said on Tuesday there has been little contact between Department of State officials and Trump’s transition team.
Asked about the transition process at a forum in Washington, DC, Kerry said: “It’s going pretty smoothly because there’s not an enormous amount of it”.
Kerry said he had not yet met Rex Tillerson, Trump’s pick for secretary of state, but expected to do so soon.
Leave a Reply