Border Patrol agents: AOC spreading 'outrageous lies'

U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. (video screenshot)

The president of the National Border Patrol Council responded to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's claims that the Trump administration is running "concentration camps" where asylum seekers are forced to drink toilet water, charging the congresswoman with spreading "outrageous, inflammatory and false claims about the dedicated law enforcement officers I represent."

Brandon Judd, whose union represents 16,000 Border Patrol agents, wrote in a FoxNews.com column Tuesday that he is "personally and professionally offended" by the freshman New York lawmaker.

He noted Ocasio-Cortez once again, in a tweet Tuesday, "absurdly" compared migrant detention facilities "to the death camps run by the Nazis who murdered 6 million Jews and millions of others during World War II."

Judd said the "outrageousness of this vicious slander is breathtaking – especially coming from a member of Congress."

"I am disgusted by Ocasio-Cortez's lies and her determination to needlessly and dangerously inflame public sentiment regarding the crisis on our southern border by abandoning facts and making wild and unsupported accusations," he wrote.

"The congresswoman is clearly using phrases designed to enrage the uninformed and to pander to a base that wants open borders and unlimited illegal immigration."

He argued that her "outrageous claim" this week that a woman was told to drink toilet water in a detention facility "is easily disproven with actual video."

Judd noted that when Ocasio-Cortez was presented with the fact that drinking fountains in jails are connected to toilets with separate water lines, she replied, "Yes, the drinking fountains are attached to the toilets, but the drinking fountains weren’t working."

"This is not true and easily debunked with facts," Judd wrote. "Almost every facility we have is blanketed with video cameras."

He said the congresswoman "is clearly not on a 'fact-finding' mission – she is on a propaganda mission."

Congresswoman calls for criminal charges

Meanwhile, Rep. Norma Torres, D-Calif., said in an interview Tuesday on "CNN Tonight" that she hoped international courts will "file humanitarian crimes" against the U.S. government and the Trump administration, Breitbart News reported.

"I pray to God that the international courts will get involved and file humanitarian crimes against this government, against this administration that has allowed this to happen," she said.

Judd argued it's Congress, not the Border Patrol, that writes the immigration laws and determines how much money and manpower his agency receives to enforce those laws.

"Ocasio-Cortez can seek approval for any changes in the law and in funding that she wishes," he said. "But she should stop blaming us for enforcing the law and carrying out our assigned duties. We’re doing the best we can with what we have to work with."

He pointed out that she voted not to fund better facilities and conditions for illegal immigrants who are detained.

"So if she wants to know who is responsible for wanting to continue the current conditions in these facilities all she has to do is look in the mirror, and look at other lawmakers who support her position," Judd wrote.

Noting she is not a fiscal conservative, he reasoned that her opposition to providing increased funding for detainees is about "playing politics with illegal immigrants."

"She seeks to raise her profile higher in the media and portray herself as the champion of the detainees – when she is in fact working against their best interests."

Hispanic pastors refute Ocasio-Cortez claims

WND reported earlier Tuesday that after claims by Ocasio-Cortez and others that migrant detainees in El Paso, Texas, were forced to drink from toilets and endure inhumane conditions, a Hispanic pastor toured the facility and "saw something drastically different from the stories I've been hearing in our national discourse."

"Even as a veteran of immigration advocacy in the U.S., I was shocked at the misinformation of the crisis at the border," said Rev. Samuel Rodriguez.

In addition, the Washington Examiner reported that during Ocasio-Cortez's visit to the Border Patrol facility Monday in El Paso, she screamed at federal law enforcement agents "in a threatening manner" and refused to tour the facility, according to two witnesses.

Also, WND reported Tuesday newly surfaced video confirms photos that indicate Ocasio-Cortez was crying in front of an empty parking lot, not suffering migrant children, during a 2018 event outside a migrant tent city that she spotlighted this week via Twitter.

Rodriguez is president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, the world's largest Hispanic Christian organization. He has advised President Trump, and Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush on immigration reform.

The Sacramento pastor said he and the other pastors "found no soiled diapers, no deplorable conditions and no lack of basic necessities."

He told FoxNews.com he asked border agents if they staged the facility in response to the negative press.

"They unequivocally denied it — we were witnessing the identical conditions the attorneys saw when they toured the facility days earlier," he said.

Rodriguez said some told him the sources of the negative coverage "never toured the areas of the facility that we toured" and speculated they might have had political motivations.

The pastors said they were encouraged by the commitment of the Border Patrol and immigration officers, many of whom are Latinos.

Rodriguez said one emotional Border Patrol agent said: "Pastor Sam, what they're saying about us is completely false. We care about these kids and have a passion for our calling."