Attorney General Jeff Sessions said Thursday the Department of Justice has active "terrorism-related investigations" into "hundreds" of refugees.
Sessions made the assertion during a national security speech in New York City, detailing President Donald Trump's agenda to keep out people like the alleged attacker who earlier this week killed eight in Manhattan.
"The Department currently has ongoing terrorism-related investigations against hundreds of people who came here as refugees," Sessions said Thursday. "The FBI and our officers do heroic work, but it is simply not reasonable to keep asking them for more and more without putting policies in place that make their jobs easier, and make us safer.
"The largest category of counterterrorism cases in the United States under investigation today are of people inspired by ISIS," Sessions said.
Sessions echoed an assertion he made earlier this year when he said "more than 300 people who came here as refugees are under FBI investigation for potential terrorism-related activities."
Sessions made another appeal Thursday on behalf of Trump's travel ban.
"The president was right to issue his executive order, the travel ban, to ensure proper vetting," Sessions said. "The countries covered by this order have failed — or are unable — to provide us the information necessary for proper vetting of their nationals. How do you vet people from North Korea? How do you vet people from Syria — where war and violence continues?
"The president has the legal right to take this action. Congress has authorized the president to stop travel from certain countries if it would be detrimental to our interests not to," Sessions said. "That's exactly what President Trump did — and he did it to keep us safe."
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