Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) GRILLED former NSA Director James Clapper and former acting Attorney General Sally Yates on the unmasking of private citizens under surveillance by the US government.
During their back and forth Yates told Senator Cruz asked Yates about her decision to block the Trump temporary refugee ban from terror states.
Yates said the president does not have the right to block refugees to America.
Yates told Cruz: “No person shall receive preference or be discriminated against in issuance of a visa because of race, nationality or place of birth.”
According to Yates, then – the president cannot ban refugees from any country from entering the United States.
Sen #Cruz thought a "Russia" hearing would be perfect to ask #Yates about the Muslim ban. Didn't work out as planned pic.twitter.com/kvFpevlUs6
— Benjamin Alvarez (@BenjAlvarez1) May 8, 2017
Of course, back in 2011 Sally Yates and Democrats said nothing when Barack Obama banned Iraqi refugees for six months from entering the US.
This was after the US discovered Al-Qaeda terrorists living as refugees in Kentucky.
As a result of this discovery the Obama administration blocked all Iraqi refugees from entering the US for six months.
There were no protests.
Sally Yates did not speak out then.
The left said nothing.
ABC reported:
As a result of the Kentucky case, the State Department stopped processing Iraq refugees for six months in 2011, federal officials told ABC News – even for many who had heroically helped U.S. forces as interpreters and intelligence assets. One Iraqi who had aided American troops was assassinated before his refugee application could be processed, because of the immigration delays, two U.S. officials said. In 2011, fewer than 10,000 Iraqis were resettled as refugees in the U.S., half the number from the year before, State Department statistics show.
Sally Yates was US attorney for the Northern District of Georgia at the time.
Yates was promoted to Deputy Attorney General in 2015.