(The Center Square) – U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said Monday that “well over” 1,000 Iranian nationals entered the United States illegally between 2021 and 2024 and authorities are on alert for potential threats.
“Well over 1,000 have entered our country and I can tell you we are on high alert and everyone is looking at that very closely,” Bondi said at a House appropriations committee hearing.
Threats of illegal Iranian nationals prompted scrutiny of the billions of dollars in budget cuts the Department of Justice is proposing for fiscal year 2026.
Bondi responded to questions from Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-Texas, on the number of Iranian nationals in the country illegally.
Gonzales cited data exclusively reported by the Center Square that more than 1,500 Iranian illegal border crossers were apprehended by Border Patrol agents between ports of entry nationwide; more than 700 of them were released into the United States.
Bondi appeared to contradict this claim and said she “didn’t know if it’s quite up to 1,500.”
Gonzales grilled Bondi on proposed cuts to national security measures in the Department of Justice’s fiscal year 2026 budget considering his concern over Iranian nationals acting as “sleeper cells” to attack the United States.
The Department of Justice’s fiscal year 2025 enacted budget was $36.1 billion, while the proposal for fiscal year 2026 is $33.6 billion. This marks a $2.5 billion cut, which includes reductions of 5,093 positions.
“When the DOJ submitted their budget, the United States was a nation at peace and now we’re a nation at war,” Gonzales said. “Now things have changed.”
He pointed to proposed cuts of $645.8 million from law enforcement and national security operations and cuts to 1,562 positions related to law enforcement and national security.
The proposed budget includes cuts to the FBI’s criminal, cyber and international operations division; counterintelligence, counterterrorism, threat screening, and weapons of mass destruction programs; and will reduce the FBI’s coordination in services with state and local partners including with forensic laboratories.
The budget request clarified the FBI will only make cuts to programs that are vacant and funded.
“I see the world is on fire more now than ever before,” Gonzales said. “In my eyes, those are the programs that we need more resources to, more manpower to,” he added.
Bondi said the Department of Justice is committed to “doing more with less” as it makes budget cuts across the agency. She called attention to provisions in the “One, Big Beautiful Bill” that would increase funding for the Department of Justice to pursue national security initiatives.
“The one, big, beautiful bill gives us a lot of additional funding at the Department of Justice to carry out our mission,” Bondi said. “That’s where it will truly help [the] Department of Justice combat all of these issues that you brought up,” Bondi added.
