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Ro Khanna: “It was a permission structure to Donald Trump saying, we…”

Featuring: Ro Khanna, Democratic | U.S. House California, 17th Congressional District

Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act

Published May 29, 2026 | Video Starts at 08:56

So they used that framework to start to target people who were Latino or who looked like immigrants. And people got caught up in this who were not violent criminal, because they eliminated due process. It was a permission structure to Donald Trump saying, we give you the authority to violate rights of people who are immigrants. It was capitulation. It was opportunism because Donald Trump had just won on this issue. (08:56–09:04)

CLAIM

Asserts that the act gave Trump authority to violate immigrant rights.

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Ro Khanna

“The FBI scrubbed a lot of the documents or held a lot of the documents before they got to the Justice Department.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 00:41-00:50
“In March of 2025, the FBI first scrubbed those documents.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 01:38-01:43
“The law that Thomas Massie and I passed, the Epstein Transparency act, required all of the documents to be released.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 01:43-01:51
“Todd Blanche was really managing the whole thing.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 00:32-00:36
“When the Justice Department got those documents from the FBI, a lot of had already been redacted or missing.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 01:57-02:04
“Even members of Congress were seeing documents fully blanked out, which the FBI had done.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 02:44-02:50
“The survivors named the names in the 302 documents that the FBI had already redacted.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 02:51-02:57
“The reality is that [the vote] allowed for deportation without due process.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 04:45-07:23
“The survivors have told us, through lawyers, some of the names.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 04:47-04:53
“South Carolina showed the nation that they could stand up for freedom and black Americans right to freely choose their own representatives.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 05:52-06:02
“We need term limits on this court and we need to expand this court and that the Democrats need to campaign against this court.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 06:10-06:17
“We should abolish ICE.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 07:55-07:58
“We should have a new immigration enforcement agency.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 07:57-08:01
“That vote was a very, very problematic vote that led to Trump's mass deportation.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 08:02-08:08
“Lake and Riley said that you could just deport people without having the due process and trials.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 08:31-08:39
“They used that framework to start to target people who were Latino or who looked like immigrants.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 08:39-08:48
“It created the structure of authority with ICE that gave them impunity to do terrible things.”
Ro Khanna on CNN's The Arena with Kasie Hunt discussing Pam Bondi's testimony & the Laken Riley Act | Uploaded May 29, 2026 | 10:24-10:33