President Joe Biden should have taken action on the southern border sooner, outgoing Acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Director Patrick “P.J.” Lechleitner said.

Biden in June issued an executive order partially suspending asylum request at the southern border. Republicans had pleaded with the president for months to take decisive action to curb a tide of migrants illegally entering the country.

Lechleitner’s comments, made to NBC News Wednesday, came ahead of his departure from the role amid the transfer of power from Biden to President-elect Donald Trump. Lechleitner explained in the interview the entirety of ICE and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) likely agree Biden waited too long to act.

“I think the career people in DHS would have liked that,” he said. “And all of us in DHS, quite frankly, I don’t know if anybody in DHS wouldn’t have wanted that earlier.”

Biden, Lechleitner continued, had the potential to authorize ICE to do much more to help resolve illegal immigration issues.

“We could have detained more people, and we could have removed more people,” Lechleitner said. “And I think we could use more resources and support. We could have done that in the last four years.”

Lechleitner also condemned those who “make their own stories up” about the limited actions ICE has taken. Biden could have counteracted this, he said, by allowing ICE the freedom to be more vocal.

“Let us talk,” he said. “Let us demystify. Because, if not, people are going to just make their own stories up about what’s going on, and it’s going to be more problematic.”

Immigration was a major topic of discussion during the 2024 election cycle and continues to be a priority for Trump ahead of Inauguration Day. Trump’s incoming border czar, Tom Homan, on Sunday issued a stern warning to migrants illegally entering the U.S. in the final days of the Biden administration.

“We are trying, but this administration, even after what happened the last couple of days, they’re still bringing thousands through the CBP One app, the CHNV program from Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti, Venezuela,” Homan said on Fox News. “They’re going to do as much damage as they can until President Trump walks back to that office.

“But a message to those thousands that they’re still bringing in every day,” he added. “You’re going home.”

The incoming Trump administration, Homan said, will conduct the “biggest border operation this country has ever seen.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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