Washington DC, Feb. 11 -- In a tense and highly charged House Homeland Security Committee hearing on Tuesday, Democratic Representative Shri Thanedar of Michigan confronted US Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Rodney Scott with blistering criticism of federal immigration enforcement, asserting that Scott and other senior officials should "hope" for a pardon from President Donald Trump given what Thanedar described as repeated violations of the law by immigration agencies.

Thanedar, a progressive Democrat who immigrated to the United States from India in the 1980s, pressed Scott and Acting US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Todd Lyons during a hearing examining oversight of the Department of Homeland Security and its...