Washington D.C. – Today, Lead Republican Michael McCaul (R-TX) appeared live in studio Sunday morning on CBS News’ “Face the Nation” with Margaret Brennan to discuss rising tensions with Iran and the latest on border security and immigration. Key highlights below: 

CBS News “Face the Nation”

Click to Watch

On border security and immigration…

“We tried to fix this the last Congress with my bill and Chairman Goodlatte. It was voted down by every Democrat. It would have provided $25 billion for border security, changed these legal loophole, asylum laws so the magnet is not there for them to come in and fix the DACA system. It didn’t work, so now we are in this Congress. I think very little appetite on the other side to get anything done, but I think at a minimum, Margaret, we have to pass humanitarian aid to take care of these children. That is the nation we are, and we have to take care of these kids.

“… I live in [Texas]. I’ve been down there throughout my 15 years in Congress and before that as a federal prosecutor. This is the worst I’ve ever seen it and it has to be taken care of.”

On rising tensions with Iran…

“I commend [President Trump] for bringing in all the national security leaders in the Congress; House, Senate, bipartisan, to discuss ‘what should we do?’ … I can strike Iran, but what would be the consequences if I did that? Are there other alternatives to that? One thought was if you kill Iranians on Iranian soil, you will only aggravate the situation. The Iranians will rile up around the Ayatollah, and become more anti-American and they will unleash what they call the ‘proxy war,’ the proxy being Hezbollah and Hamas and other terrorist organizations. I think what the president did was he exercised restraint. He was thoughtful and measured and said, you know, I’m going to take a step back right now, when he found out that 150 people would be killed, take a step back and see if there is another way to get this done.

“… I know from that meeting [President Trump] has no appetite to go to war in Iran. He doesn’t want to get dragged into a ten-year decade war in Iran. He wants to do everything he can to exhaust every other possibility to stop that from happening. He wants Iran to be nuclear-free. He thinks this is the best way to do it.

“We want [Iran] to be more desperate. We want them to have their economy crippled. We want them in a position where they have to negotiate with us and the coalition partners in the free world toward a better Iran for their people without nuclear weapons. I think that is the ultimate goal, and I think this route as opposed to what President Obama did where he lifted them up and gave them $150 billion in cash and re-energized their terror operation, I don’t think that one worked too well.”

###