Families who have lost loved ones at the hands of illegal immigrants surrounded former Acting Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Thomas Homan on Tuesday as he called for a border wall to be built.

“No matter how many times you hear these tragic stories, it doesn’t get any easier,” Homan said outside of the Capitol.

“We’re here about a border wall,” Homan said. “I’m not a politician; I’m not running for office.”

“I’m a career law enforcement officer that retired about six months ago,” Homan said.

“There is no manufactured crisis,” Homan said, repeating a claim the left has made about President Donald Trump’s description of the national security and humanitarian crisis unfolding at the border. “We need a border wall.”

Homan pointed out during his remarks that until now Democrats have been in favor of building a border barrier to stop illegal immigration — before Trump became president.

“This isn’t about national security,” Homan said. “This isn’t about the Democrats.”

“This isn’t about securing our border,” Homan said. “This is about hate for Donald Trump.”

“This is about not giving this president a win on the border,” Homan said.

But, Homan added, “If our president wins on the border, America wins on the border.”

Homan noted the outrage from the left over the deaths of two migrant children in the latest border surge. He has seen other people and children die, including one five-year-old who suffocated in the back of a truck that was attempting to smuggle people into the United States.

Homan also cited a statistic from Doctors Without Borders that shows 31 percent of females trying to immigrate into the U.S. through Mexico have been sexually assaulted.

Homan confirmed Trump’s claim that it is not just people looking for a better life who want to come to the United States but people who want to harm the country and its people, including terrorists.

“I detained them as ICE director,” Homan said, adding that the number of people detained trying to get into the U.S. at ports of entry isn’t the main concern.

“The question isn’t how many got arrested by border patrol,” Honan said. “The question is how many did not get detected by border patrol?”

Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) was one of several Republican lawmakers on hand to support the Angel Families.

The irony was not lost on this constituency of the left’s concern for migrant children whose parents break the law getting into the country and who are then separated from their parents for legal proceedings.

The families gathered in Washington, DC, will never see their children again.

“We have to have a secure border,” Gohmert said.

And Homan said Trump is the one to get it done.

“There’s no president of the last six presidents that’s done more for border security, public safety and people like the angel families than President Trump,” Homan said.