Arizona Senator Mark Kelly on sanctions on Russia and immigration

(CBS, KYMA/KECY) - Senator Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) spoke with Margaret Brennan on Face the Nation Sunday about sanctions on Russia for the ongoing war in Ukraine.

According to Brennan, President Donald Trump could "could lift some, but not all, sanctions on Russia, unless Congress agrees to do it," prompting her to ask Senator Kelly if there's an appetite to lift them, to which he said:

"I don't have an appetite to lift them. Putin continues to execute an illegal war where he is intentionally killing women, children, old people. I visited Ukraine several months ago, went to a veterans hospital where nurses there just witnessed horrible atrocities. So, I think, if anything...we need to continue to put the pressure on Putin, on Russia. Make them pay for this illegal war, attacking our NATO ally. And I've got to say, I know you talked to Mark Rutte earlier, and the ambassador about the visit on Friday in Alaska. And, I hope we got something out of this. Putin is a war criminal. This is not a show of strength to allow him to fly into the United States, to land here, to negotiate with our president. I don't know for certain...I don't know what was the ground rules that were set for this negotiation, but I would expect that this administration should have extracted something for this visit."

Brennan then followed by reporting that "there was a US directive in recent weeks that all Russia-Ukraine peace negotiation information should not be shared with our partners who are part of the Five Eyes," like Australia and the United Kingdom.

This led her to ask Kelly, since he sits on the Intelligence Committee, if he was aware of the directive, and what the directive indicates, and Kelly responded saying:

"I was not aware of it. We have a special relationship with those Five Eyes partners, and I think that relationship makes all of us collectively safer. So, if it was up to me, we would continue to share that information with those allies. Restricting information about Russia-Ukraine, about the situation in Iran, about what's going on in Gaza or the Western Pacific with, you know, China just makes us all less safe. So, I was not aware of it, but it does not seem like an appropriate thing to do."

During the interview, Brennan and Kelly about immigration in the United States.

U.S. border agents have been directed to stop deporting migrants under President Trump's ban on asylum claims, following a federal court order that said the measure could not be used to completely suspend humanitarian protections for asylum-seekers, two Department of Homeland Security officials told CBS News.

The move effectively lifts a sweeping policy that had closed the American asylum system to those entering the U.S. illegally or without proper documents. It's a measure the second Trump administration has credited for a steep drop in illegal immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border, where officials last month reported the lowest monthly level of migrant apprehensions on record.

Trump's asylum crackdown was unprecedented in scope. The proclamation underpinning it, issued just hours after he returned to the White House in January, gave U.S. border officials the power to summarily deport migrants without allowing them to request asylum, a right enshrined in American law for decades.

Trump said the extraordinary action was necessary due to what he called an "invasion" of migrants under the Biden administration, which faced record levels of illegal crossings at the southern border until it too restricted asylum last year.

According to Brennan, Kelly visited an ICE facility in Eloy, Arizona last week, where he shared, on social media, about meeting a woman who was detained at the Marine Base in Yuma.

In the post, Kelly said the woman, whose name is Maria, has been in the U.S. for 20 years, has a son in the Marines, and was looking after her grandson. Kelly said at the time she was detained, Maria was coming back from the grocery store.

This prompted Brennan to ask Kelly if he's asking, or somehow managing, to have her be an exception to the rule to allow her to stay in the U.S., to which the senator said:

"I spent about three hours or so over at the Eloy Detention Center and met with two women. One was Maria, the one you just mentioned, whose son was a U.S. Marine, whose daughter in law was a U.S. Marine, and the daughter in law needed to have an operation. So, she came from New Jersey. She's lived in the country for 20 years, and then she winds up in CBP custody. I asked her about when her son graduated from boot camp, and how that made her felt. She started crying and said it was so proud. She was so proud that her son was a U.S. Marine. He's about to re-enlist. This woman is no threat to society. I also met a business owner who's been in the United States for over 20 years. She's got 70 employees. She's got three restaurants. She's about to open another one. Again, this is a mom. Her daughter's a U.S. citizen, her mother's a U.S. citizen. Sisters, a U.S. citizen. Husband is a U.S. citizen. Neither of these women are a threat to society. And what I saw at Eloy were a lot of moms and grandmothers who could be out with their families, who could be going to work as they go through whatever immigration process they're in. And for Maria, the mom of the Marine, there is a process that, for a somebody on active duty, that their parents have a process to become a permanent resident and eventually a U.S. citizen. And this, this is not where we should be, and I don't think this is what the American people wanted...The border security issue under President Biden, was not working, and I pushed the administration on that. But we have now swung drastically in another direction, and I don't think this is what the American people want either."

To watch more of Brennan's interview with Kelly, click here.