WAHINGTON–U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), Ranking Member of the U.S. Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security, on Wednesday released the following statement on the Trump administration closing three watchdog offices within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS):

"This is yet another illegal power grab by the Trump administration to shutter independent agencies created and funded by Congress. Closing these three offices — the Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman, the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, and the Office of the Citizenship and Immigration Services Ombudsman — is an attempt to bypass any scrutiny or oversight of their cruel agenda. By doing so, the Trump administration has eliminated most safeguards on immigration detention at a time when watchdog offices are most needed. The result will leave people being held in detention vulnerable to abuse, make the immigration system more chaotic than it already is, and increase costs for taxpayers. Once again, the Trump Administration is choosing to create more challenges at the border than trying to solve them.”

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