If confirmed, Gonzalez will be the first Senate-approved director of the agency in more than four years. “I also wanted to make sure that we continue to remain focused on having the avenues necessary to arrest serious offenders in our community that impact our public safety,” he said. “Diverting valuable law enforcement resources away from public safety threats would drive undocumented families further into the shadows & damage our community safety,” Gonzalez said in another tweet at the time. In February, Biden issued temporary guidelines instructing ICE to narrow its focus and prioritize arresting people who have recently crossed the border or are deemed public safety threats. Throughout the hearing, the Republican lawmakers repeatedly returned to the relationship between ICE and local-level law enforcement — in what may be a test of Gonzalez’s potential to become the first Senate-approved ICE director since the Obama administration.

Source: Los Angeles Times July 15, 2021 20:31 UTC