Attorney General Jeff Sessions said Friday that his agency is targeting gangs, which he said are waging an “assault on law safety.”
“I have a message for the gangs that target our young people,” he said at the federal courthouse in Central Islip, N.Y., where protesters gathered outside. “We are targeting you. We are coming after you. The MS-13 motto is ‘kill, rape and control.’ That’s their motto. Our motto is going to be justice for victims and consequences for criminals.”
The MS-13 gang has been blamed for the deaths of 11 youths in and around Central Islip dating back to the beginning of the school year.
“We will prosecute gang members who commit crimes to the fullest extent of the law and after they’re convicted, if they’re not here lawfully, they’re going to be deported,” Sessions said. “This is the Trump era.”
Sessions also stressed that he would not sign any consent decrees, which he fears overly restrict police activities in the name of civil rights.
Sessions has spoken out previously against the court-binding police reform agreements. He said again that his agency will not sign them going forward if because they “cost more lives by handcuffing the police instead of criminals and [stop] lawful police procedures that have been proven to reduce crime.”
Sessions repeated his desire to prevent cities from adopting policies that make them so-called “sanctuary jurisdictions.”
These policies, he said, “make our country less safe. I understand there are those who disagree. But the American people rightly demand a lawful system of immigration. Congress has established a lawful system of immigration.”
This week, a federal judge in California issued an injunction against President Trump’s executive order meant to curtail sanctuary policies by pulling government funds from cities that adopt them.
Sessions has said the Justice Department will fight the ruling, and said on Friday that it is public safety and fighting illegal immigration that matters most.
“This is just the beginning,” he concluded. “[W]e will maintain public safety; we will uphold the Constitution and enforce our nation’s laws; and we will ensure equal justice for all Americans. And I am confident that with the President’s support and with you leading the way, we will win this fight.”
