Come to the second panel of witnesses first the special agent in charge of the field office for u. S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for the department of Homeland Security. Mr. Mile myles has worked with e Homeland Security investigation for over ten years and has an impressive record. Welcome. Next we have the honorable michael who currently serve as a chair of scott county mississippi. Athe Law Enforcement duties include keeping the peace within the county and in addition to serving as the counties jailer and keeping the jail and currently lives in mississippi. Serving as the mayor of canton mississippi, one of the six cities with a raid on august 7. He was elected to the office in 2017 but began working in the Public Interest in the age of 16 and h he was accompanied at the table with the superintendent of public schools, one of the districts located. Without objection, the witnesses for students will be inserted into the record and i now ask each witness to summarize it his or her statement for about five minutes beginning with mr. Myles. Chairman thompson and distinguished members of the committee thank you for the opportunity to appear before you to discuss a strategy that consists of a threepronged approach. Enforcement, criminal arrest of employers come administrative arrest of employees, compliance for the employment eligibility verification inspections, civil fines and suspensions and outreach the mutual agreement between government and Employers Program. HomelanHomeland Security invests is the departments primary agency focused on the transnational organizations and ais the sole investigative ageny become by the authorities hsi investigates the enforcement or within 400 criminal statutes that protect the nations travel and financial immigration systems. A special agent used this authority to investigate all types of criminal activity and working closely with donations in federal state, local, tribal Land Partners in the unified strategy to secure the United States. Today i would like to speak about the efforts in conducting targeted Law Enforcement operations. We do not conduct the sweeps were checkpoints. Any such reports create panic in places with Law Enforcement personnel. Groups falsely supportin doing e doing a disservice to those they claim to support. Hsi utilizes the inspections across the wide spectrum of industries throughout the United States. Hsi refers to the suspension and to prefer the federal Government Contracting individual businesses that commit serious criminal or serious offenses engaged in fraud or other in public conduct. The agreement between government and employees and Employers Program is a voluntary partnership with the private sector that offers training to ththe workforces and curbed unemployment of authorized workers. It seeks to promote principles of business conduct and to prevt the deliberate hiring of unauthorized workers through the selfgovernance. They begin to adopt the image best practices they will be able to enhance the focus with the nations immigration law. Hsi prioritizes the criminal worksite enforcement investigations by focusing on the most egregious violators that includes employers that mistreat or exploit the workers based upon the unlawful status and the workforce in the United States, create false identity documents or facility document fraud, utilize unauthorized workers of the Business Model in order to win we will be higher unauthorized workers. Hsi continues to prioritize the Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources sectors and industries by ensuring that they do not have access to sensitive facilities or information. August 7, 2019, they executed a federal criminal search warrant and seven federal civil search warrant. These were the result of an 18 month investigation that was initiated person went to the tip line against the Companies Involved and today i will explain in the time allotted to me. He worked diligently to develop a plan to address the concerns that came out of the previous activities of this size or nature and they conducted coordination meetings could among all of the participating partners as well as the execution of the operation. Each was given its own group to manage the decisions of the local bubble to minimize the detention pure go of those determined to be amenable to some type of humanitarian relief. There were 32 cases to include those identified on theme. The preassigned personnel to make phone calls with the impact of schools after the operations began. We also set up a telephone hotline provided custody information to the relatives and friends of individuals detained in connection to the support obligation. The hotline provided information to the callers. They dedicate dedicated within 0 investigative powers to the case and see used mor seized more th0 documents, 61 digital devices and more than 2 22 terabytes of data. The criminal activities and identification of more than 400 individuals using the previously issued Social Security numbers. These investigations continued. Im grateful to appear before you and share these actions and discuss the commitment to utilize the authorities. I thank you for the support that you provide us the execute permission and i look forward to your questions. Thank you for the testimony and i now recognize the sheriff to summarize his statement for five minutes. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee is an honor and privilegaprivilege to appear beu to discuss the recent enforcement action in scott county. I am the sheriff of scott county and have been since 2007 and previously served as the chief of police for the city for ten years and have nearly 30 years of Law Enforcement and career enforcement. Ive lived in scott county all my life. As the highest ranked lawenforcement officer i am responsible for policing our entire county. For the perspective of the county, scott county is east of the city of jackson. They have approximately 28,000 residents. The most recent census data provided by the Census Bureau states that approximately 11. 5 of our citizens identify. Weve had latino workers in scott county since the 1990s. Over 3,000 people some of which are immigrants constitute a large workforce in scott county and are important to the economy. Theyve become part of the community, the children attend local schools and participate in local sport. The feedback i have received from our citizens is that folks admire latino communities, work ethic and the commitment to family. I based that on the fact i have not seen a spike in crime is the result of latino individuals leaving and working in our county. We are holding approximately 125 inmates. Only three of those identified as latino and one of those three is in scott county resident. This in my opinion on the criminal Justice System simply put the Scott County Sheriffs Department has not had problems with the latino community. I previously mentioned cook foods. One of the largest employers on august 7, 2019 of course it was one of the plants in the state of mississippi federal immigration officials raided nearly 250 employees were arrested by immigration officers. First let me say i swore an oath to uphold the constitution of the United States and the constitution of the state of mississippi. I stand behind federal officers and in no way am i criticizing the hard work of enforcing our immigration laws. However i feel the actions on this day could have been handled better at my agency been prepared in advance. My office said no notice of the raid and therefore was taken by surprise. After this, my office, the school system, local citizens all have to step up to care for many of the children whose parents were arrested. The children of those arrested had nowhere to go for hours when school let out. They didnt arrive until 11 that night. Thanks to the schools, local citizens that included my wife and daughter and my department, we were able to care for those children however for warning of the action was for going and would have a lot of my office to be better prepared for the problems left in the wake of the raid. Thank you for the opportunity to appear. The chair recognizes the state went for five minutes. I want to recognize congressman lee and all youve done not just for the state of mississippi but for the nation. Congressman thompson highway are well aware of the competition and we thank you for being here. I have with me today the School District and the chief of poli police. What happened on that day the clandestine acts perpetrated i want to take you back to 2019 went without the acknowledgment they invaded for the purpose of identifying those that worked there were those in the state of mississippi that were created by icepack to be co vice for the intended mission and as the mayor of the city of canton was never noticed. I informed about the plans of one of our businesses here in the city. My discovery was accidental. As a consequence of a citizen informing me that i lived on fulton street and carried workers away by handcuff who were transported to the National Armory in mississippi. I approached one of them and introduced myself as the mayor of the city and requested to speak with whomever was in charge for the purpose of trying to understand and to assess what was occurring in my city. It was at that time i was able to visualize for the purpose of being transported to a heist which was unknown to me at that time. No africanamerican workers were elected were transported. The police chief, the superintendent of education and the director of the department of Human Services were never informed. Its my understanding that at the time they took place, some of the individuals were documented with appropriate papers. This was the first day of school and the children of these individuals arrested and transported to an unknown site to be processed. The children were still in school. And return home not knowing that their parents had been arrested. The population are not gang members or rapists or murderers, but folks who work and pay taxes, purchase goods, take care of each other and their family. It is my understanding that there were at least 125 to 130 hispanic employees who were arrested that resulted in a loss of 125 to 130 people working. I do not know the Economic Loss nor the impact of this to the city of canton but i do know that it was an economic impact. Throughout the state of mississippi, there were seven industries that were rated to 600 people arrested, 30 of those released. This was a terrifying moment for those individuals that included desecration of parents and children. Its my understanding nothing was in place but to be faced, protected and secured. No social Services Including dhs were on the noticed to target children who were going to be separated from their parents. I am of the opinion that when they raid the community they are a target in that community and at least the mayor and the government authorities, the chief of police come superintendenon thesuperintended director of Human Services should be placed on notice. It was a terrifying experience for the arrestees in a personal experience for me and my community. The congressman talked about this and a lot of people said to be coming here say you are too young to remember this but when she was talking about that record she was talking about plessy versus ferguson as we went over the ground versus board of education. She was talking about little rock nine. Talking about the merits being blocked out of the universities of mississippi. She was talking about the atrocities of humanity and the demand, the brutality during the time of yesteryear. Think all of you. Thank you very much. [applause] i yield myself five minutes for opening questions. You had the advanced notice. Ive received no advance notice while they were continuing. Your testimony your conversation with the superintendent of education and or chief of police and fire chiefs there was no notificati notification. So, what is the policy sa does y about the notifications . We dont have a policy that says we are obligated to notify anyone. I want to enter into the record a letter from matthew whose Deputy Director senior official let me tell you what he said in the letter is clark, loral in Forest County you need to provide them to the committee. Im more than happy to provide them. Did you contact the Scott County Sheriffs Department . I never said i did. I will ask the question. We did contact the School Districts. What about the canton School District . It seems like we only contacted the county School Districts. If i told you that it was located in the canton School District, would i say that is an oversight . That you did not contact there is no reflection of the schools being contacted. What social Service Agencies did you contact . We didnt conduct any social Service Agencies but its my opinion that they spoke to someone in the social Service Agency but i dont remember the name. Who told you that . The United States attorney. She was in our office injects jackson mississippi. He told you he talked to somebody but you dont know who. I dont remember the name that he gavbuthe gave me. Have you gotten any information about the companies that have the individual simply . You perform the work site. What is needed if you say that is not needed. That is our investigation against the other allegations in the investigation. The one you keep relating to try to get to the information. Im doing the best i can. Not giving very good. You asked me what we got and i told you i got 850,000 i will ask that question and you just answered only when you are asked. No editorializing. Okay. Thank you. Youve been in scott county of your life. Determined whether or not they are threats to the community and i think your testimony has pretty much said these are good people. Am i correct . Let me make sure that im making this clear for those that were taken primarily if not all they may have criminal records known to me but they were good hard working people. I wont yield to the gentle lady from texas. Thank you so very much. Let me thank all of the witnesses. Mr. Miles, sheriff lee, the sheriff in houston. I work extensively with Law Enforcement and of course i know that let me be very clear this isnt intended to not recognize the legal apparatus of the United States of america dealing with the question of law and immigrants. We are a nation of law and immigrants. But i do want to plaintively try to raise some concerns. I have the response ability of oversight. The chairman for the hearing. What we find out, did you find any high dollar targets among the 608 courses that you wrapped up . I would ask you to clarify what you mean by that high dollar targets. Involved in the nature criminal activity, somebody youve been looking for for decades, months. Anybody in that group . To date, no. My time is short. You released about 300 fewer immediately so that shows that they either have some basis of being able to get out is that correct . We release them for humanitarian reasons. But that means they were not they were even too dangerous to release. That is the case correct . How long have you been in office or . Since its inception in 2003. Under the administration, you were able to do your job is that correct . I know that under the Previous Administration there were deportations and im not asking that question, but the rate of this type during those eight years, just you in particular. Those eight years i was in mexico. But you did not engage in one whether it was mexico or the United States. As indicated, this administration didnt get any high dollar targets. You use t used to have a Million Dollars in one days work as i understand the numbers is that correct . Its my understanding the numbers provided was the cause for the total investigation. I would have to go back and look. The precise numbers that are still not reunited with their family. I dont have that number. Do you realize how inviting the answer is quite you may have relatives, nieces or nephews. We are looking at families here. For me to sit here as a mother and have the answer you do not know the answer to the question, let me make an official request i think the chairman already have a letter but again i want to know the numbers of children that are not yet reunited with their family members. Well you provide to us . I will do everything in my power to give it to you. Let me thank you very much. I promote the working of federal Law Enforcement with local Law Enforcement how devastating is it for your department, out on the streets dealing with protecting the community not to know about this, how devastating and piercing it is in terms of the relationship with your federal Law Enforcement which i know that you work with very well. We work with and welcome all federal agencies and work well with them. When these were done, the need for secrecy was felt for the lack of better terms, the word did not get out and i underst