White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki confirmed that illegal immigrants are indeed issued free smartphones. However, she defended the initiative as part of efforts to monitor these immigrants as they enter the United States.
Peter Doocy, Fox News White House correspondent, played a pivotal role in extracting this admission from Psaki.
He asked during an April 6 press briefing if the move to issue smartphones to illegals formed part of the Biden administration's plan to deter illegal immigration. "Our team in Texas is saying that you guys are starting to give smartphones to border crossers, hoping they they'll use the phones to check in or be tracked," said Doocy.
The Biden administration spokeswoman retorted that Doocy, of all people, "would recognize that [the Biden administration needs] to take steps to ensure that we know where individuals are and we can track [and] check in" with illegal immigrants.
Psaki then outlined three technologies the administration is using to track the movements of illegal immigrants. Two of these involve the use of mobile devices such as smartphones.
First, the telephonic technology "uses a participant's voice to create a biometric voiceprint during the enrollment process." When immigration officers call the participant to check in on their location, the latter's voice is compared to the voiceprint on the database. Second, the SmartLink technology utilizes facial recognition technology to monitor where an illegal immigrant is located using their smartphone. Third, global positioning system monitoring relies on satellite tracking through an ankle bracelet to track illegal immigrants' location and movement patterns.
"[These are] all part of out effort, as individuals come into the U.S. and individuals who are entering who will proceed to immigration proceedings, to monitor and track where they are," said Psaki. (Related: Jen Psaki gives completely unacceptable answer when pressed about why Americans must have vaccine proof but illegal aliens don't.)
Tracking technology useless when illegals throw away phones
Doocy followed up with another question, asking if the Biden administration was concerned that illegal aliens "will take the phones and just toss them" – rendering the tracking technologies useless.
The White House correspondent's question is not without basis. His colleague, Fox News correspondent Bill Melugin, brought up the possibility of illegal immigrants simply throwing away the government-issued mobile devices in a tweet.
"Sources tell me with parole releases, the [illegal immigrants] are asked to turn themselves in to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in a city of their choice. I'm told many of them are given these phones by the government to track them and allow them to communicate with ICE, but there's no way to stop them from being tossed," he wrote.
Psaki then countered by asking Doocy if he had a record of the illegal immigrants discarding the smartphones, to which the Fox News correspondent replied: "I'm just asking if that's a concern."
Refusing to answer Doocy's question, Psaki continued that the concern was "ensuring that individuals who irregularly migrate to the U.S. [not only] proceed through a process of being monitored, [but also participate] in hearings to determine whether or not they will be able to stay."
"I would note that nearly 80 percent of non-citizens released at the border from Department of Homeland Security custody under prosecutorial discretion have either received a notice to appear or are still within their window to report. So actually – the vast, vast majority of people are reporting. In part, we have these monitors and monitoring systems in order to do that effectively."
Visit OpenBorders.news for more stories about the Biden administration's response to illegal immigration.
Watch an exchange between Peter Doocy and Jen Psaki over illegal immigration below.
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