Dereliction of Duty by ICE

Power Line reported Wednesday on a vote by the National Immigration and Customs Enforcement Council of the American Federation of Government Employees, the union that represents ICE agents and employees. The rank and file unanimously passed a vote of no confidence in the agency's leadership.

Did you get that? The vote was unanimous. Every single person voted against the leadership.

The union "stated that ICE has 'abandoned' its core mission of protecting the public to support a political agenda favoring amnesty. "

The union denounced John Morton, who heads ICE, and Phyllis Coven, assistant director for the agency's office of detention policy and planning. It stated that the integrity of the agency "as well as the public safety" would be "better provided for in the absence of Director Morton and Assistant Director Coven."

Among the other points unanimously agreed to are these:

• The majority of ICE's enforcement and removal officers are prohibited from making street arrests or enforcing U.S. immigration laws outside of the jail setting.

• Hundreds of ICE officers nationwide perform no law enforcement duties whatsoever because of resource mismanagement within the agency.

• ICE detention reforms have transformed into a detention system aimed at providing resortlike living conditions to criminal aliens based on recommendations not from ICE officers and field managers, but from "special-interest groups."

• The lack of technical expertise and field experience has resulted in a priority of providing bingo nights, dance lessons and hanging plants to criminals, instead of addressing safe and responsible detention reforms for noncriminal individuals and families.

• Unlike any other agency in the nation, ICE officers will be prevented from searching detainees housed in ICE facilities, allowing weapons, drugs and other contraband into detention centers -- putting detainees, ICE officers and contract guards at risk.

• Senior leadership ignores reports that ICE internal investigations by the office of professional responsibility conceal agency and supervisor misconduct and are used to retaliate against employees who make whistleblower-type disclosures or question inappropriate policies and procedures.

As Paul Mirengoff, the Power Line writer, says, imagine if this vote had happened during the Bush administration. Imagine if it was only a handful of ICE agents voting against Bush's ICE leadership. Every single paper and every single left-leaning news outlet would be trumpeting the news 24/7.

But under Obama, it's only the right-leaning Washington Times that ran the story.