Joe Arpaio, the controversial former Maricopa County sheriff whom President Donald Trump pardoned in August, on Thursday said that he’ll support “whatever final policy” the President comes up with to restore the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.
“Whatever final policy he supports, I’ll also support,” Arpaio told the Los Angeles Times.
He called Trump “very intelligent” and claimed the President “cuts deals,” but said the decision about what to do with the program should ultimately fall to Congress, because Trump “can’t make it himself.”
Arpaio denied that Trump was betraying his supporters on the subject of immigration, and said Trump was “trying to make deals and get stuff done.”
The former sheriff, who was convicted of criminal contempt for violating court orders dating back to 2011 barring his office’s practice of racially discriminatory traffic stops targeting immigrants, said if it were up to him, he would ask Congress to deport undocumented immigrants brought to the country as children who were protected by DACA.
“Why not send them back to the country where they came from? It’s good for them to go see the country where they came from,” Arpaio argued.
He said deported DACA recipients could then “come back legally” and “cut to the front of the line.”
“But that’s just some of my views,” he added. “I’m not the President.”
