We Marines believe that God gave America the greatest gift He could bestow to man while he lived on this earth -freedom. We also believe He gave us another gift nearly as precious - our soldiers, sailors, airmen, Coast Guardsmen, and Marines - to safeguard that gift and guarantee no force on this earth can ever steal it away.
We cannot gamble with American lives. I will not gamble with American lives.
If you want to get into the United States, the best way, I believe, is to ride the network. There is no convergence between, say, the criminal networks and the Islamic extremist networks.
The one thing I was always told is you absolutely have to tell truth to power. Whether you're a second lieutenant working with a captain and a lieutenant colonel, or a four-star general working with the Office Secretary of Defense and the White House, the decision makers have got to have ground truth.
Whether you're a second lieutenant working with a captain and a lieutenant colonel, or a four-star general working with the Office Secretary of Defense and the White House, the decision makers have got to have ground truth. Otherwise, the decisions they make could be flawed - and that can be dangerous.
There will be no use of military forces in immigration. There will be no - repeat, no - mass deportations.
I don't agree with registering people based on ethnicity or religion.
I guess, over time, I had convinced myself that I could imagine what it would be like to lose a son or daughter. You try to imagine it so that you can write the right kind of letters or form the right words to try to comfort. But you can't even come close. It is unimaginable.
If you were to build a wall from the Pacific to the Gulf of Mexico, you would still have to back that wall up with patrolling by human beings, sensors, observation devices.
I've learned that, in many cases, people say, 'I want ground truth,' and they don't really mean it. There are warts all over this organization, as there are in many organizations, but you just have to tell truth to power and let the chips fall where they may.
Unless confronted by an immediate, visible, or uncomfortable crisis, our nation's tendency is to take the security of the Western Hemisphere for granted.
