Maryland fires back against EPA claims about its offshore wind permit
The Maryland Department of the Environment is defending the permit it issued to a wind farm proposed off the coast of Ocean City, after a challenge from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
The Thursday letter from Maryland Secretary of the Environment Serena McIlwain also said the state would not be reissuing the permit, as the EPA requested, because the state had not made a mistake that needed correcting.
The EPA had contended that when Maryland issued the permit to Baltimore-based company US Wind, it identified the wrong process for citizens to file appeals.
Amy Van Blarcom-Lackey, EPA administrator for Region 3, which includes Maryland and other mid-Atlantic states, contended in a July 7 letter that any appeals challenging the air pollution permit issued to US Wind should be filed to the clerk of the EPA's Environmental Appeals Board.
But Maryland argues that its permit would need to be appealed through the state courts, which would involve filing a challenge at the appropriate circuit court — in this case in Worcester County.
Notably, the due date for a state court challenge has already passed. It was set for July 14 — about a month after MDE issued the permit, according to MDE's website.
'Long-settled procedure dictates that state-issued permits are appealed under State law, not Federal law,' McIlwain's letter says.
Trump's EPA flags a problem with offshore wind permit issued by Maryland
That letter also cites written decisions issued by the EPA's appeals board, including one that stated that the board 'lacked jurisdiction' to evaluate this type of permit.
'MDE will not re-issue the permit and will continue to follow the proper state procedures to consider appeals,' McIlwain concluded, near the end of the roughly two-page letter.
A request for comment from the EPA was not immediately returned Friday.
The MDE website for the US Wind project originally referenced both the state appeals procedure and the EPA process, but McIlwain said that information had been 'included at EPA's request. It has been removed, and language has been added clarifying that the Federal appeals process does not apply.'
Authority to issue Clean Air Act permits like the one for US Wind is delegated to the state from the EPA — the basis of the federal agency's claim for jurisdiction for appeals. That authority, specifically for permits on the outer continental shelf, was re-certified in early 2024 under the Biden administration.
The US Wind project, which is planned about 10 miles from Ocean City's shoreline, is the wind project that is closest to construction in this region. The company, which leased the area in 2014, received a key permit from President Joe Biden's (D) Department of the Interior at the end of 2024.
Final buildout of the project is still years away, but it calls for construction of 121 wind turbines, up to four offshore substations and one meteorological tower, according to the state's website. When complete, the project could generate 2,200 megawatts of energy, enough to power up to 718,000 homes, according to the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.
Practically since its inception, the project has faced fierce opposition from local officials in the resort town, who cite concerns that beachgoers would lose a pristine ocean view if the turbines were visible from shore.
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Since President Donald Trump (R) took office for his second term, offshore wind projects have landed in his crosshairs. Earlier this week, Trump announced that wind and solar projects would undergo increased scrutiny under his administration. Trump's 'Big, Beautiful Bill' also rescinds tax credits for renewable energy projects that do not begin construction by next July.
In April, Trump appointed Blarcom-Lackey to lead the EPA's Mid-Atlantic office. She succeeded Marylander Adam Ortiz, who moved to a deputy secretary role at MDE.
Two other companies have offshore leases in the vicinity of Ocean City and the Delaware beaches — Ørsted and Equinor. While Ørsted received its first lease area around the same time as US Wind, Equinor won its auction last year. Neither project have received its federal permits from the Interior Department's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.
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Los Angeles Times
3 minutes ago
- Los Angeles Times
At immigration courts, volunteers support migrants arrested by ICE in hallways
SEATTLE — After a Seattle immigration judge dismissed the deportation case against a Colombian man — exposing him to expedited removal — three people sat with him in the back of the courtroom, taking his car keys for safekeeping, helping him memorize phone numbers and gathering the names of family members who needed to be notified. When Judge Brett Parchert asked why they were doing that in court, the volunteers said Immigration and Custom Enforcement officers were outside the door, waiting to take the man into custody, so this was their only chance to help him get his things in order. 'ICE is in the waiting room?' the judge asked. As President Trump's mass deportation campaign focuses on cities and states led by Democrats and unleashes fear among asylum seekers and immigrants, their legal defenders sued last week, seeking class-action protections against the arrests outside immigration court hearings. Meanwhile, these volunteers are taking action. A diverse group — faith leaders, college students, grandmothers, retired lawyers and professors — has been showing up at immigration courts across the nation to escort immigrants at risk of being detained for deportation by masked ICE officials. They're giving families moral and logistical support, and bearing witness as the people are taken away. The Northwest Immigrant Rights Project was inundated by so many community members wanting to help that they made a volunteer training video, created 'Know Your Rights' sheets in several languages and started a Google sheet where people sign up for shifts, said Stephanie Gai, a staff attorney with the Seattle-based legal services nonprofit. 'We could not do it without them,' Gai said. 'Some volunteers request time off work so they can come in and help.' Robby Rohr, a retired nonprofit director, said she volunteers regularly. 'Being here makes people feel they are remembered and recognized,' she said. 'It's such a bureaucratic and confusing process. We try to help them through it.' Volunteers and legal aid groups have long provided free legal orientation in immigration court, but the arrests have posed new challenges. Since May, the government has been asking judges to dismiss deportation cases. Once the judge agrees, ICE officials arrest them in the hallways and put them in fast-track deportation proceedings, no matter which legal immigration pathway they may have been pursuing. Once in custody, it's often harder to find or afford a lawyer. Immigration judges are executive branch employees, and while some have resisted Homeland Security lawyers' dismissal orders in some cases, many are granted. Masked ICE agents grabbed the Colombian man and led him into the hallway. A volunteer took his backpack to give to his family as he was taken away. Other cases on the day's docket involved immigrants who didn't show up. Parchert granted 'removal in absentia' orders, enabling ICE to arrest them later. When asked about these arrests and the volunteers at immigration courts, a senior spokesperson with the Department of Homeland Security said ICE is once again implementing the rule of law by reversing 'Biden's catch-and-release policy that allowed millions of unvetted illegal aliens to be let loose on American streets.' Some volunteers have recorded arrests in courtroom hallways, traumatic scenes that are proliferating online. How many similar scenes are happening nationwide remains unclear. The Executive Office for Immigration Review has not released numbers of cases dismissed or arrests made at or near immigration courts. While most volunteers have done this work without incident, some have been arrested for interfering with ICE agents. New York City Comptroller and Democratic mayoral candidate Brad Lander was arrested after locking arms with a person in a failed attempt to prevent his detention. Lander's wife, attorney Meg Barnette, had just joined him in walking migrants from a courtroom to the elevator. The volunteers' act of witnessing has proved to be important as people disappear into a detention system that can seem chaotic, leaving families without any information about their whereabouts for days on end. In a waiting room serving New York City immigration courtrooms, a Spanish-speaking woman with long, dark curly hair was sitting anxiously with her daughter after she and her husband had separate hearings. Now he was nowhere to be found. The Rev. Fabián Arias, a volunteer court observer, said the woman whose first name is Alva approached him asking, 'Where is my husband?' She showed him his photo. 'ICE detained him,' Arias told her, and tried to comfort her as she trembled, later welling up with tears. A judge had not dismissed the husband's case, giving him until October to find a lawyer. But that didn't stop ICE agents from handcuffing him and taking him away as soon as he stepped out of court. The news sparked an outcry by immigration advocates, city officials and a congressman. At a news conference, she gave only her first name and asked that her daughter's be withheld. Brianna Garcia, a college student in El Paso, said she's been attending immigration court hearings for weeks where she informs people of their rights and then records ICE agents taking people into custody. 'We escort people so they're not harassed and help people memorize important phone numbers, since their belongings are confiscated by ICE,' she said. Paris Thomas began volunteering at the Denver immigration court after hearing about the effort through a network of churches. Wearing a straw hat, he recently waited in the midday heat for people to arrive for afternoon hearings. Thomas handed people a small paper flier listing their rights in Spanish on one side and English on the other. One man walking with a woman told him, 'Thank you. Thank you.' Another man gave him a hug. Denver volunteer Don Marsh said they offer to walk people to their cars after court appearances, so they can contact attorneys and family if ICE arrests them. Marsh said he's never done anything like this before, but wants to do something to preserve the nation's rule of law now that unidentifiable government agents are 'snatching' people off the streets. 'If we're not all safe. No one's safe,' he said. Bellisle, Attanasio and Slevin write for the Associated Press and reported from Seattle, New York and Denver, respectively.
Yahoo
32 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Johns Hopkins Carey Expands MBA, Launches EMBA In New D.C. Campus
John Hopkins University Center in Washington, D.C., houses nine academic schools, including Carey Business School. Will Kirk / Johns Hopkins University Leveraging both its expertise in the business of health and a new headquarters in the heart of Washington, D.C., Johns Hopkins University's Carey Business School is rolling out a wave of new programs and expansions for fall 2026. Among them, Carey will move its full-time MBA from its Baltimore campus to D.C., while expanding the program. It will also launch its first-ever Executive MBA geared toward working professionals. Both programs will build on Carey's strengths in artificial intelligence and experiential learning and are among a list of new offerings the school announced last week that will reshape the school's graduate portfolio. 'Our job is to set our students up for success, and one important way we can do that is to offer them learning environments that spark their passion and curiosity and offer opportunity for success after graduation,' says Alex Triantis, dean of . Since a comprehensive five years ago, Carey has leaned into Johns Hopkins' global expertise in medicine, public health, and biomedical research, becoming a global leader itself at the intersection of business and health. One-third of Carey's 2024 Full-time MBA graduates are pursuing careers in health care, and more than 25% of its faculty are engaged in health-related research. The school offers a dozen MBA dual degrees, six of which are in the business-of-health. Meanwhile, Washington D.C. needs leading health talent. The sector accounts for the second-largest group of private employers in the district while more new private-sector jobs were added this April in education/health care than in any other industry. It's why Carey is starting new or expanding current programs into the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg Center, located between the White House and the U.S. Capitol at 555 Pennsylvania Avenue. Opened in 2023, the center houses nine Hopkins academic schools including Carey, the new School of Government and Policy, its schools of medicine and nursing, and the Bloomberg School of Public Health. New or expanded programs in D.C. will include: Carey's will expand and move to the Bloomberg Center for the fall 2026 cohort. The Hopkins MBA mixes health care know-how, a sharp focus on tech, and real-world learning. The move will give students prime access to government and policy leaders, DC's business community, and a network of Carey alumni. It also offers a specialization in Health, Technology, and Innovation. Carey's , beginning in fall 2026, is a 19-month program designed for professionals with around 10 years of experience. It offers specializations in Health Care and Leadership & Strategy, and will have several in-person residencies in D.C. AI is integrated throughout the curriculum to prepare leaders for how it is already shaping their industries and services. Finally, Carey will launch a new suite of exec courses called from both its Baltimore and D.C. campuses. The academy, opening in January 2026, is a partnership with the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Johns Hopkins University Carey Business School Dean Alex Triantis. Courtesy photo Carey is also launching several new programs at its Baltimore campus. These include an Accelerated MBA for current or recent Hopkins grad students, a 9-month , and with the Bloomberg School of Public Health. Carey's dual MBA degree portfolio includes a total of 12 full- and part-time options. All Carey programs are built with AI and experiential learning at the core. It was one of the first business schools to introduce artificial intelligence into its MBA all the way back in 2019 – three years before ChatGPT. Today, students use AI tools in real-world partnerships with companies like Siemens and Salesforce, gaining hands-on experience in tech-focused roles. Carey is also home to an award-winning portfolio of experiential learning programs that connect students directly with industry challenges. In the Innovation Field Project, for example, student teams serve as consultants in eight-week engagements, delivering actionable solutions to organizations like AstraZeneca, Medstar Health, the International Monetary Fund, and the Office of Veterans Affairs. It's a lot going on at a business school that has yet to turn 20, a milestone the school will celebrate in 2027. Poets&Quants recently sat down with Dean Triantis to talk about Carey's expansion into Washington, D.C., and how the school is preparing students for the future of business. We teach our students that they should always look out for market opportunities and be strategic about their product portfolio. So I'd say we're doing what we preach. We've been working now for two or three years on identifying where the opportunities for us could lie. We already have a presence in DC, and it's a fantastic building in terms of location and amenities. DC is a great city for young professionals and students, so we saw this as an opportunity to expand our full-time MBA there. At the same time, we haven't previously had an executive MBA. As you probably know, we're a young school. Despite the fact that the market doesn't appear to be growing significantly, we've been successful in entering and gaining market share in other areas, and we hope to do the same with this program. I think we're offering a program that will be unique, and we believe we can differentiate ourselves as we've done with our full-time MBA. We're doing a lot at once and also taking advantage of the fact that we've become a leader in dual-degree programs. I think we have over a dozen graduate programs that couple together with the MBA. We've focused on making this opportunity available in an accelerated format, allowing students to step out from other graduate programs or complete their graduate programs and then do an accelerated MBA in one year. This way, they can get the depth of their functional area combined with the breadth of the MBA. We're also introducing the Master in Management (MIM), which is huge in Europe and has developed nicely in the US as well. Many students want to get business education earlier in their careers, some even at the undergraduate level. For us, as a graduate school, this means the Master's in Management, we're offering it both in-person and online. At a general level, the reputation of Carey Business School has grown significantly over the past few years. We have strong word-of-mouth. One distinct offering is our specialization in the business of health. That specialization, with our faculty, courses, and the events we host, will truly differentiate us from other schools in the area. Johns Hopkins Carey is moving its full-time MBA to the university's Washington DC campus while launching a brand new EMBA. The move will give students prime access to government and policy leaders, DC's business community, and a network of Carey alumni. Will Kirk / Johns Hopkins University We've also leaned into AI. Every school is trying to incorporate AI now, but we were relatively early, introducing a course about six years ago in our full-time MBA. We've continued to build on that, leveraging the broader university's strengths, and all of our faculty have enthusiastically embraced it. On the tech side, the AI component (which everyone now needs) is a real strength for us. Additionally, our building's location provides several advantages. First, we're not the only tenant; it's a 'One Hopkins' building. The School of Advanced International Studies is there, along with a new School of Government and Policy. When you consider today's critical business issues and how closely they connect to policy and the international sphere, we think we can leverage those institutional strengths effectively. Our location is also strategically close to the Capitol and government agencies. Consequently, many companies maintain offices nearby. There are about 18 Fortune 500 company headquarters in the DC area, and nearly every major company has at least a small office. This proximity often allows us to engage CEOs who visit DC for hearings or meetings. When we learn of these visits, we can arrange events and bring these leaders directly to our students, which has proven beneficial in the past. We'll see how the demand shapes up. We've definitely seen an increase in applications over the past few years, and we hope this expansion will further drive that growth. We've intentionally been highly selective to maintain a relatively small program, allowing us to provide personalized attention to each student. I don't have exact numbers yet, but we can certainly update you once we have a clearer sense of interest. Primarily, it's the location and the ability to build on what we're already doing. We've leaned heavily into experiential learning, and this expansion will further enhance that. One new aspect is that we'll offer, I believe, six certificates students can pursue, including one in AI and business. Additionally, we have many electives from our Master of Science programs offered in DC, which will enrich the range of opportunities available to students. Similar to our full-time MBA, we know we can attract students interested in the health ecosystem and offer opportunities other schools might not be positioned to provide, thanks not only to our faculty but also the close-knit network we have with the School of Medicine, Public Health, Nursing, Biomedical Engineering, and others. That will certainly be one of our specializations. While we're not the only school offering health as a specialization in an EMBA, we've demonstrated success with it in our full-time MBA, so we're confident we can replicate that success. Additionally, as I mentioned earlier, our EMBA will have monthly residencies primarily in DC. We'll also include global courses and probably some activities in Baltimore, but most residencies will be in DC. That location allows us to easily engage professionals from industry and government, as well as leverage expertise from other parts of Hopkins. For example, when considering global business strategy, having someone from the School of Advanced International Studies who might have served in a prior administration adds unique depth and richness to our program. We believe we have a very strong offering. As to why we didn't introduce it sooner, this just feels like the right moment to launch. Yeah, that's a great question. First, I think it reflects the changing demands of students. With these dual degree programs, everyone is looking for something extra to differentiate themselves in their careers. It's not just students in public health, nursing, or engineering saying, 'I also want to get an MBA.' Even those pursuing careers in consulting are seeing firms value candidates who, for example, have a PhD in biochemistry alongside an MBA. Hopkins has a long-standing tradition of smart people doing challenging research, and that attracts not just dual-degree students, but also those in our regular full-time or Flex MBA programs. In fact, close to a third of our MBA students already hold a graduate degree. That speaks to the appeal of combining breadth and depth, which dual degrees provide. The second piece is about flexibility. Students want options in terms of program length, format, and affordability. If we can offer something shorter and more cost-effective than a traditional two-year MBA – especially for students who've already made a significant investment in another graduate degree – that's incredibly appealing. Online and flexible options are increasingly important as well. We've seen strong demand for our Flex MBA and also for our MS programs. We currently have six MS programs, and with the MIM launching next year, that'll make seven. Many students want to spread out the cost and time commitment, especially working professionals. So yes, I do think schools need to offer more personalization, more choice, and more flexibility to stay competitive. The biggest trend we're watching is digital health, especially the role of AI in healthcare. On the research side, there's a lot happening. We have the , which is primarily focused on research and policy. It brings together Carey faculty and faculty from the schools of nursing, public health, medicine, and biomedical engineering. There are over 150 core faculty collaborating on research and events around various issues. For example, we've hosted events on AI and aging, AI policy, and FDA policy changes related to AI-enabled medical devices. Many of our students take advantage of those events. We also have a focused specifically on this space, which continues to grow rapidly. We're seeing increasing student interest in entrepreneurial opportunities in this area. Another major area we're watching is policy change: how it impacts the market and how different sectors are responding. There's a lot of attention on areas like mental health, Alzheimer's care, home care, and telehealth. These all involve different approaches to improving affordability, access, and overall value in the system. It's an exciting time. There's a broad recognition that business plays a critical role in driving innovation and impact in healthcare. Johns Hopkins University Carey Business School's Baltimore campus. School photo This initiative responds to the ongoing transformation in healthcare whether through policy, digital innovation, or structural shifts. What we're hearing from many health professionals is that they feel a need to deepen their business knowledge to complement their clinical expertise. What's exciting is that we're partnering with the School of Medicine to deliver this program. Faculty and clinicians from both Carey and the School of Medicine will be involved. It's a multi-week academy with components delivered in person in DC and Baltimore, as well as in a hybrid format. The goal is to bring together leaders from across the healthcare ecosystem. We expect strong participation from healthcare systems, but we also anticipate interest from pharma, medtech, and biomedical device companies. These professionals may have brilliant innovations—a new device or a breakthrough in life sciences—but unless they understand the healthcare system they're selling into, how doctors and practitioners adopt new tools, and how to effectively launch their products, that innovation may not reach its full impact. So ideally, we'll bring together participants from across all these sectors to create a rich, collaborative learning environment. For now, it will be fairly general. We already have a one-year MS in Healthcare Management, offered both full-time and part-time, which tends to attract students who are specifically focused on the healthcare ecosystem. The MIM will be broader, more in line with most other MIM programs in the U.S. It's designed for students who likely don't have a business background or experience but recognize the advantage of gaining that foundation to launch their careers. They'll come in, and we'll educate them quickly on the core business skills they need. We're also launching the MIM in an online or flexible format, which is less common for these types of programs. That flexibility is important for people who can't take a full year off and need to continue working while pursuing the degree. It also opens up possibilities for students who start the program and later get a great job opportunity. They could take it and finish the degree afterward. We're still ironing out the details, but we see real opportunities in that flexibility. First, our facility in DC is really a game changer. We didn't have that two years ago. Rather than launching new programs as soon as the building opened, we decided to wait, let the dust settle, and see how it was being used. We've actually been planning this expansion for two or three years, and now the timing makes sense. The MIM reflects growing interest from students who don't have five to ten years of work experience but want to supplement their education with business training. We don't offer an undergraduate business major, so the MIM complements our offerings well. In fact, we've had interest from our own undergrads and others in the area who want to pair their undergraduate degree with a graduate business credential. We've been expanding our number of 4+1 agreements both domestically and globally over the last few years, and we're seeing a lot of interest in combining an undergrad degree with either a specialty master's, like in finance, or a more general degree like the MIM. If you look at PhDs in the U.S., a lot of them don't end up in academia. They go into industry or consulting. So while I'm not going to claim we're the first to do this, coupling a PhD with an MBA is still relatively novel. We've had many PhDs come to us after finishing their doctorate, looking to get an MBA. Now that we've thought more deeply about the structure of our full-time MBA, we've realized there's a real opportunity to formalize this interest into a dedicated, accelerated dual-degree product. So it's not like some magic pixie dust came down and made all this happen at once. It's really been the result of thoughtful planning that has just happened to converge at the same time. Six years ago, the focus was really on helping MBA students understand AI. What was this thing that was about to hit? At the time, the course was taught by who had students do some basic coding to demystify AI. He asked them to come up with an idea for a product or process that would be AI-enabled. We saw a lot of excitement right away. But today, the students coming in don't necessarily need to be introduced to what AI is, and they don't really need basic programming skills in the same way students did six years ago. Back then, introducing coding was a big innovation for business schools. That's changed. Now, it's more about understanding the trajectory of AI, how it's disrupting industries, and the ethical and regulatory questions that come with it. Instead of one course, we now offer several that integrate AI into functional areas. For example, students specializing in finance might take a course on large language models in finance, while others might explore predictive analytics in marketing. AI has cascaded down into many different subjects and is much more infused across the curriculum. At this point, it's hard to teach corporate strategy or business analytics without addressing AI whether in terms of how it's impacting decision-making or what tools are critical to use. Our faculty are genuinely excited about it, too. We don't have to push them to include AI. They're already doing it, because it's so relevant in their individual areas. In the MBA program, we realized a few years ago that while we had experiential learning like every other school, we needed to be more intentional about it. So we asked: What exactly do we want students to learn and apply when working with companies? And how can we weave that consistently throughout the curriculum? One outcome of that reflection was the creation of a big data analytics experiential program, where all the students work on the same problem. That's different from our Innovation Field Project, which is a more traditional consulting-style project. We've also integrated our communications training throughout these experiences. For example, students need to know how to present their work effectively, and we built that into the structure. Our Crisis Challenge is another piece, focusing on a specific communication or leadership skill in a high-pressure scenario. All of this has been mapped out with the goal of ensuring students build the right skills and tools to be effective in their first job and beyond. I'd say that intentional design is what really differentiates our approach from others. I'd say the evolution of Carey has centered on building a world-class faculty as the foundation. Every year, we've worked to strengthen our faculty, and one of our key differentiators is the ability to hire across different schools at Hopkins. Right now, we have five (and that number is growing) Bloomberg Distinguished Professors, who are required to hold appointments in at least two schools. That structure has helped us build strong ties with Public Health, Engineering, the School of Advanced International Studies, and the School of Government and Policy. That interdisciplinary integration has been a core part of our strategy. We don't view business in isolation, we view it as something that must be connected with other disciplines across the university. In terms of program evolution, we're maturing our portfolio by adding elements that other schools have long offered, like the EMBA and MIM, while expanding our delivery options through full-time, flexible, and online formats. We're also growing our global footprint in executive education and forming more international partnerships. So I'd say we've reached a strong point of maturation, but one that still allows us to approach things a bit differently from other business schools. Our differentiation in the business of health is a big part of that, as is our growing emphasis on AI. But more broadly, we're asking: What do business leaders need today? And how can we bring those elements together from across Hopkins and beyond? The DC presence, the location, and the additional resources it provides are going to be key to helping us continue growing in this direction. We've been fortunate so far, and I think many business schools haven't fully felt the implications of some of the new pressures. But in a time of uncertainty, flexibility becomes essential. That's part of why we've broadened our portfolio. Whether it's the full-time MBA, the EMBA, or other offerings, we've created multiple pathways for students, especially those who don't want to step away from their careers for two full years but still want the value of an MBA. Our Flex MBA has been very successful, and we expect that to continue growing. To withstand these challenges, you need to stay flexible, maintain a broad and responsive program portfolio, and be attuned to market trends. That's what we're focused on, listening closely and being able to pivot quickly when needed. DON'T MISS: LEARNING AI 'FROM ITS CORE': INSIDE PROFESSOR TINGLONG DAI'S COURSE AT JOHNS HOPKINS CAREY BUSINESS SCHOOL AND ROTMAN ENTERS ACCELERATION RACE WITH TWO NEW ONE-YEAR BUSINESS DEGREES The post Johns Hopkins Carey Expands MBA, Launches EMBA In New D.C. Campus appeared first on Poets&Quants.
Fox News
an hour ago
- Fox News
Unmasked ICE officers speak out against being 'villainized' for enforcing immigration laws
ICE agents have been doxed, demonized and terrorized since setting President Donald Trump's mass deportation plans into motion – and now three unmasked agents are pushing back against rhetoric that has landed them in the public's crosshairs. "It has been very sad to see how we're villainized, the names used towards us," officer Kristian Moreno told "My View" host Lara Trump this weekend. "Just doing this [interview] right now, I had to talk to my family about it and say, 'Hey, this is something that I believe in, something I think is important for us to get our stories out there and let the American public know we're humans.' We got a job to do. We're just enforcing the law. We're not making up the law, and it's sad, but we just keep pushing through it," he added. Moreno works out of the field office in Baltimore, Maryland. He initially served in the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) before going to Customs and Border Protection (CBP) in San Ysidro, California. He and officers Edgardo Centeno and Chris Sandoval shared their inside-looking-out perspectives on the violence ICE officers risk daily, as the Department of Homeland Security indicates assaults against ICE agents have surged 830% since President Trump's second term began in January. Centeno boasts the longest service record of Trump's three guests. Despite serving across four administrations, he has "never seen" anything like the hatred ICE faces today. "I think the dynamics and environment that we're working in is sad. What we've seen in California, Los Angeles, New York, it is, in my opinion, unacceptable," he shared. "We have to do our job. We raised our hands to defend the Constitution, and we're enforcing the law, so we're adjusting as we see what's going on in our country, but it's saddening my heart, especially when you serve in combat and come back and see your country so divided." Centeno, who was born in New York and grew up in Puerto Rico, holds a background of military and law enforcement service. His eagerness to continue serving in a capacity to help his community and the nation compelled him to join ICE. While not mentioning any specific lawmakers, he blasted those he said have allegedly "encouraged" members of the public to go after ICE officers while stressing that his agency does targeted operations instead of going after families and individuals. "I believe in the First Amendment, and you can express yourself all you want, but when you are enforcing, as a Congress member… [people] to go after us, then you're crossing that line," he said. "We should not be afraid of doing our jobs. I raised my hand to defend the Constitution, and I'll die for it. That's who I am, and I know my partners are the same here." Some Democrats have drawn ire from Republicans after introducing a bill that would require federal immigration law enforcement officers to not wear face masks and have legible IDs while on the job. Many argue the measure could jeopardize officers and their families by exposing their identities. The DHS has also accused some Democrats and media outlets of inspiring violence against ICE officers with their "lies and fake stories." Sandoval, who is based out of Houston, shared that some officers are being videoed or photographed, and the content is posted online so they can be put "on blast." "It's kind of unfair to where… we're doing our job, we're serving the country, but sometimes I see people writing and stuff, and you're hurting your own community," he said.
