NYC ICE enforcement chief urges lawmakers to change laws, not demonize agents
Kenneth Genalo, New York City's ICE enforcement chief, pushed back against city and state officials seeking to abolish the agency, arguing that policy disputes should be settled by changing the law rather than attacking federal officers.
The head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement's New York City enforcement operations, Kenneth Genalo, is pushing back against local politicians who want to abolish the agency, telling Fox News Digital that lawmakers should change the law instead of demonizing the agents who carry it out.
Genalo spoke after a July letter signed by 143 New York officials, including 31 City Council members, called for ICE to be abolished. The letter cited fatal shootings by federal immigration officers in Minneapolis. Among the signers was Rep. Claire Valdez, and Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have also backed abolition. Genalo said the rhetoric surrounding the agency has contributed to escalating tensions on the ground.
Genalo, a 34-year government veteran, described those tensions through a ride-along in Brooklyn, where agents made two arrests, one of them a man with a pending felony charge. He also described an incident in which protesters disrupted the arrest of a man facing child sexual abuse charges. Genalo said scenes like these explain why the public debate has grown so heated, and he argued that agents doing their jobs should not be cast as villains. He also drew on lessons from cooperation with local authorities after the September 11 attacks, which he cited as a model for what working relationships can look like.
The dispute over cooperation between the city and federal immigration authorities has a long history. Genalo pointed to the local release of suspects despite ICE detainer requests as a central problem. Under Mayor Bill de Blasio, a Rikers Island unit that once screened foreign-born inmates was ended. Mayor Eric Adams later sought to restore cooperation, and City Council restrictions followed. Mayor Mamdani has since threatened legal action over ICE use of city parking lots.
The Department of Homeland Security has rejected the mayor's position, pointing to sexual assault and robbery convictions among the people it seeks to detain. Genalo said he opposes a state law that would extend limits on cooperation beyond New York City. He also noted that the City Council declined to put the question of ICE cooperation to voters.
Governor Kathy Hochul and Attorney General Letitia James have set a November 25 deadline for detention agreements, according to the reporting. Genalo's position is that the path forward runs through lawmakers rewriting the rules rather than through attacks on the officers enforcing them, and that the coming deadline puts the question of how the city and state will cooperate with federal authorities squarely in front of elected officials.
Source: foxnews.com
26
