A CBS News “60 Minutes” segment about a man deported to Ghana has drawn a public rebuttal from the Department of Homeland Security, which says the broadcast left out key facts about how the man originally obtained legal status in the United States.
The segment profiled Moussa Diawara, a man from Mali who was deported in July after overstaying a tourist visa and evading a final removal order issued by a judge in 2012. Diawara was sent to Ghana rather than Mali after arguing he would face persecution if returned to his home country. The report described the toll his deportation took on his wife and two children in the United States.
DHS General Counsel James Percival disputed the framing of the story on X, saying the network omitted the basis of Diawara’s original asylum claim.
“This illegal alien is @60Minutes poster child for what it claims are wrongful deportations,” Percival wrote. “I pulled his file. His claimed reason for fearing Mali was that he is ‘gay,’ just in case you’re wondering how bad the immigration fraud problem is.”
According to his asylum application, Diawara wrote: “Since I came to the USA I had the possibilities to express my feelings to men without any embarrassment no reserve.” He also stated, “Although I was born as a boy, but things appeared differently for me as I was already having female behaviors and feelings. I was more comfortable being intimate with boys rather than with girls.”
Diawara went on to marry a woman and have two children, a fact that has drawn scrutiny over the original grounds for his refugee status. Percival’s post suggests DHS views the discrepancy between the asylum claim and Diawara’s subsequent family life as evidence of immigration fraud, which under federal law can be grounds for deportation regardless of how long ago a case was adjudicated.
CBS’s “60 Minutes” segment did not address the details of Diawara’s original asylum application in its broadcast. The network has not issued a public response to Percival’s statement.
The case highlights an ongoing dispute between the Trump administration and national media outlets over how deportation cases involving long-settled removal orders are portrayed, with DHS officials arguing that coverage often omits the legal basis for enforcement actions.
