Expelled Rep. George Santos (R-NY) expressed interest in being appointed Director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in a second Trump administration.

“My new year resolution is that President Trump returns to the white house and in 2025 I can be appointed Director of ICE. It’s time to reclaim our country and if you believe the nonsense numbers the media is giving you then you are accepting the big lie!” Santos said Tuesday.

“We have over 50M+ people who have invaded our sovereignty over the years due to careless and neglectful immigration policy, if given the job I know exactly where to start and run the much needed raids of removals proceedings this country needs. Enough abuse and disregard for our sovereignty, we are the United States OF America and not a global dumping hub,” he continued.

“ICE has had their hands tied for far too long with the sole exception of the great four years of DJT. The time is now and that’s why I’m putting my name in the mix for a role that will take grit and a fearless person and not a coward that will fear media spin. Bring it on #MSM I’ll take you all on again with glee,” he added.

The Hill reports:

Santos interacted with the media frequently during his time in the House as he faced numerous political scandals that ultimately led to his ouster last month in a 311-114-2 vote. The New York Republican is the sixth lawmaker to be expelled from the lower chamber.

Santos faces 23 federal criminal charges related to allegations that he misled donors, fraudulently received unemployment benefits, lied on House financial disclosures, inflated his campaign finance reports and charged his donors’ credit cards without authorization. He pleaded not guilty to all charges. The House Ethics Committee also released a scathing report finding there is clear evidence Santos committed serious crimes, which helped compel some holdouts to vote for the embattled lawmaker’s ouster after two attempts to expel him failed.

Santos initially pledged never to return to Congress but recently said he would consider running again. He has not indicated whether he wants to stay in politics throughout his career.

In the post on X, however, Santos said he knew “exactly” what was needed to lead ICE properly and made an informal public bid for the hypothetical position.

ICE reported for fiscal 2023 that the “number of illegal immigrants on the non-detained docket has soared from 3.7 million in FY 2021 to nearly 4.8 million in FY 2022 to nearly 6.2 million in FY 2023,” Fox News noted.

Per Fox News:

The non-detained docket includes illegal immigrants who have final orders of removal or are going through removal proceedings but are not detained in ICE custody.

The number on the detained docket has increased from 22,000 to over 36,000 in the same period.

The number of illegal immigrants being deported has increased, according to the report, but it is still a fraction of the increase in the illegal immigrant population. There were 142,580 removals in FY 23, up considerably from 72,177 in FY 22 and 59,011 in FY 21, but still down from the highs of 267,258 under the Trump administration in FY 19. ICE noted that the 142,580 removals were in addition to over 60,000 Title 42 expulsions in FY 23 at the border, some of whom it said would have otherwise been subject to deportation.

That’s at the same time as there were a record 2.4 million migrant apprehensions at the southern border. Those numbers have looked likely to continue, with Fox News reporting on Friday that December will shatter records for monthly encounters with over 276,000 encounters. Fox has previously reported that officials have said they are releasing around 5,000 illegal immigrants into the U.S. each day.

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