Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson on Tuesday was asked by a Congressional panel Tuesday whether the White House had reached out to the family of Kate Steinle, the woman shot to death in San Francsco. An illegal immigrant deported five times has been charged in her death.
"To who?" Johnson asked.
"To the family of the woman who brutally murdered by this individual who had committed seven different felonies in four different states and my understanding had been deported, kept coming back, has the administration reached out to that family?" Republican Rep. Steve Chabot of Ohio responded.
"I’m sorry, I don’t know the answer to that question sir," Johnson said.
Story continues below video.
Chabot noted that the administration has sent representatives to the funerals of several high-profile murder cases recently, and asked Johnson to find out if the White House has any plans to reach out to the Steinles.
Conservative commentators Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly were unimpressed with Johnson's response.
"He doesn't know who she is. The director of Homeland Security has no idea, when he hears the name Steinle family, he doesn't know who it is. Or at least he's acting like he doesn't know who it is,"
Limbaugh said on his radio show. "How does he not know who this is? Is it possible he wouldn't know of a woman murdered by an illegal alien that's been in the news for a week because of a sanctuary city provision that allows this clown to stay in town, would he not know this? Very, very, very interesting."
"Hard to believe he didn't even know who Kate Steinle was," O'Reilly said on Fox News Channel's
"The O'Reilly Factor."
"He is the director of Homeland Security."