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Updated: Jun 26, 2018 11:01 IST

US president Donald Trump on Tuesday described immigration reform as his top priority and renewed his push for an immigration system that prevents people from entering America illegally.

“One of the highest on the list is immigration. And we have to change our laws. We have to make them sensible,” Trump told reporters in a joint media appearance with King Abdullah II Bin al-Hussein of Jordan in the Oval Office of the White House.

“We want a system where, when people come in illegally, they have to go out. A nice simple system that works. Mexico holds people for four hours, for five hours, for two hours, and they’re gone. We have people for four, five, six years and they never leave. So we want to have a great immigration,” Trump said in response to a question.

The US president also attacked the Democrats, who he said, are in favour of open borders and alleged that they ‘do not care about our military’.

“What we have is very simple. We want strong borders and no crime ... The Democrats want open borders and they don’t care about crime, and they don’t care about our military. I care about our military. That’s what we want and that’s what we’re going to get. And we’re going to get it sooner than people think,” he said.

White House press secretary Sarah Sanders later told reporters that virtually all Americans agree that it makes no sense that an illegal alien sets one foot on American soil, and then they would go through a three-to-five-year judicial process to be removed from the country.

“Thousands of illegal aliens are removed every month, without seeing an immigration judge, as a result of procedures in current law, including voluntary removal and expedited removal. Just because you don’t see a judge doesn’t mean you aren’t receiving due process,” she said.

Sanders said the president is focused on securing borders and reforming immigration system to prevent the crisis at the border from getting worse.

Trump, she said, likes to see people being stopped illegally from entering the country at all.

“We’d like to have secure borders. The Democrats are the ones that want open borders. The president would like us to secure the borders and have a very legal and easy immigration process so people can come here the right way, not the wrong way,” she said.

Responding to a question, she said Trump would certainly like to see more expedited removal.

“Ultimately, the president would like to see our border secured so that we don’t have all of these problems to begin with,” she said.

The White House spokesperson affirmed that Trump wants to stop the crime that comes into the US, and his administration hopes to do the same, adding they would like to see the Congress ‘step up and work with us’.