Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly says his department is not targeting so-called Dreamers in deportation efforts.
In an interview on CNN's "State of the Union" aired Sunday, Kelly said efforts to secure the border are focusing on criminal illegal immigrants – and not those brought to the United States illegally as children by their parents, and who have been protected under the 2012 Obama administration's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals.
"The president told me to do two things: He told me to secure the southwest border, all of our borders… and to take the worst of those that are in our country illegally, take them, look for them and deport them, so that's what I'm doing," he said.
He also disputed that those who are victims of crime, and in the country illegally, should be in fear of reporting those crimes to local police.
"I would just again tell the illegal immigrant community, if you are simply here illegally,we don't really have the time to go after you," he said. "We're looking for bad men and women and we're doing that very, very effectively."
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