Hegseth lays out Trump’s plan to hold migrants at Gitmo for deportation in new interview

"[The] DoD and DHS are in complete partnership behind President Donald Trump's mission to secure the southern border. Everyone watching the show understands that responsibility was completely abdicated for four years under the Biden administration. We've seen an invasion of criminal gangs, of human trafficking, of drug trafficking, that's completely unacceptable.

"And so, you saw on day one from President Trump, executive orders reestablishing the military — the military specifically — commitment to protecting territorial sovereignty of the southern border, which is a shift. The military has been in support of DHS and rightfully, in many ways rightfully so, for a long time. We’ve allowed an invasion that needs to stop.

Hegseth then provided details on the active-duty troops that have been sent to the southern border: "The President declares an emergency. We’re committed to that. So, we've sent troops, both National Guard and reserve but also active-duty to the southern border, Marines to the southern border, both to assist in CBP and DHS in interdictions, but also to help fortify the border wall that President Biden allowed to become more dilapidated with gaps and now we’re filling in those gaps.

"Ultimately, we’re also providing for the first time ever, Will, ever — gray tails, as we call them — military aircraft to support mass deportations," he continued.

"As CBP finds criminal aspects and others who are here illegally, DoD is there to support exporting those folks to other countries. Now, in some cases, that's taken some time and President Trump has been very clear with those countries that if you aren't willing to take your criminals back, your illegals back, then we will hold you accountable and things have shifted quickly," like what was recently seen with the president of Colombia, who got into a back-and-forth with President Trump after he refused to accept illegal immigrants flown in from the United States. That decision was changed quickly after President Trump said that he would put major sanctions on the South American country and that he would remove the visa office from the American Embassy in Bogota.

"In other cases, we want somewhere else to hold them safely in the interim. Criminal illegals. Guantanamo Bay, Will, is a perfect place. I served there from 2004 until 2005. Americans think of Gitmo as the images you see on your screen, right, the detention facilities with folks from Taliban and al-Qaeda. Those are the people I guarded in Camp Five, in Camp Six, and Camp X-ray. That's one part of Guantanamo Bay. The other part of Guantanamo Bay, Will, is a naval station where it has long been for decades a mission of that naval station to provide for migrants and refugees and resettlement, so there are places — this is not the camps. You’re putting criminals in camps where ISIS and other criminals — this is a temporary transit, which is already the mission of Naval Station Guantanamo Bay where we can plus up tens of thousands if necessary to humanely move illegals out of our country where they do not belong back to the countries where they came from in proper process," he said.