Democrats Freeze Senate Confirmation Process for Joe Biden's ICE Chief

Senate Democrats froze the confirmation process for President Joe Biden’s deportation chief on Tuesday amid unconfirmed allegations he abused his wife.

The March 8 decision was triggered by Sen. James Lankford (R-OK), who asked committee chairman Sen. Gary Peters (D-MI), to focus on the allegations against Sheriff Ed Gonzelez, Biden’s nominee to head ICE, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.

“The affidavit, brought to my attention by the National ICE Council and Federal Police Foundation, outlines the incident,” Lankford said in his March 7 letter. He continued:

If these allegations of physical and violent domestic abuse are true, they are disqualifying for a law enforcement officer at any level and raise significant questions about the nominee… It would be irresponsible for the Senate to vote on the confirmation of Sheriff Gonzalez to be Director of ICE until we determine whether the allegations outlined in the attached affidavit are true. The cloture motion should be immediately withdrawn until this matter is resolved.

Gonzalez and his wife reportedly maintain their innocence and deny the claims.

“A White House official said the administration still supports Ed Gonzalez’s nomination and urged swift confirmation,” Bloomberg Government reported.

The Hill reported:

Peters asked for unanimous consent to withdraw a procedural motion to advance Gonzalez’s nomination after Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) sent a letter to him and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) raising concerns about the allegations.

Gonzalez was nominated in April 2021, but his confirmation has been delayed by GOP opposition.

However, the GOP members of the Senate earlier allowed the fast-track confirmation of Gonzalez’s likely boss, pro-migration zealot Alejandro Mayorkas.

Since his confirmation in February 2021, Mayorkas has grounded ICE agents, reduced ICE’s deportation numbers, and sharply expanded the inflow of migrant workers, consumers, and renters into U.S. communities. The confirmation — or rejection — of Gonzalez is not expected to change Mayorkas’s pro-migration policies.

Mayorkas’ confirmation was backed by several pro-establishment GOP senators, including Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Mitt Romney (R-UT), Dan Sullivan (R-AK), Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV),  Susan Collins (R-ME), and retiring Senator Rob Portman (R-OH).

Lankford is facing a GOP primary this year prior to the November ballot. His primary opponent is a populist pastor, Jackson Lahmeyer.

Lankford is not a supporter of immigration reductions. On numerous occasions, he has backed bills that would increase the flow of legal immigrants and illegal migrants into Americans’ jobs and homes.

“They are in the job market, they are currently a part of our economy, currently,” he said in 2017 about illegal migrants. “That continual competition in our economy doesn’t hurt us, that continues to help us — it actually hurts us to put those individuals out of the economy.”

Oklahoma loses much investment, wealth, and status because federal immigration policy provides coastal investors and employers with a continuous river of legal and illegal migrants — as well as visa workers — to boost their coastal investments in new jobs and real estate.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported in Jul 2021:

Workers in the Oklahoma City, OK Metropolitan Statistical Area had an average (mean) hourly wage of $24.04 in May 2020 [$961 per week], about 11 percent below the nationwide average of $27.07 … wages in the local area were lower than their respective national averages in 15 of the 22 major occupational groups: arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media; computer and mathematical; and educational instruction and library.

The regional skew of cheap-labor migration on investors’ job-creation plans is highlighted by a 2021 report at an economic research site, SSTI.org.

The report shows late-stage venture capital investments are concentrated in the states where investors and their new workers — legal and illegal migrants — prefer to live. For example, in the last three months of 2020, investors made investment deals worth roughly $2,028 per person in California, $936 per person in New York, $167 per person in Pennsylvania, $128 per person in Ohio, $52 per person in Kentucky — and 55 cents per person in West Virginia, which is ranked among the poorest states in the union.

“Just the five leading metros account for more than 80 percent of total venture capital investment and 85 percent of its growth over the past decade,” Bloomberg reported in 2018. “That’s spatial inequality on steroids.”

Since at least 1990, the D.C. establishment — including the establishment GOP — has used a wide variety of excuses to justify its policy of extracting tens of millions of migrants and visa workers from poor countries to serve as workers, consumers, and renters for U.S investors and CEOs.

The economic strategy of extraction migration has no stopping point, and it is harmful to ordinary Americans because it cuts their career opportunities and their wages while also raising their housing costs.