While Suffolk County Legislator Samuel Gonzalez is not as vitriolic as the dozens of more prominent Democrats labeling Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) as “modern-day Gestapo” or “masked thugs”, his July 14, 2026, public statement follows the same pattern as those calling to abolish the federal agency. Describing them as “unarmed and vulnerable people”, he cites reports indicating “52 people have died while in ICE custody or under its supervision during the first 500 days of the current federal administration,” highlights their marginalized group “immigration status,” and calls for investigations, accountability, and justice.
Just as the facts showed allegations of racism against police involved in deadly force incidents were completely unfounded and minimized the violent criminality, underlying medical conditions, or illegal substance abuse of the suspects involved (Alton Sterling and Philando Castile were both reaching for guns) - the same holds for incidents involving ICE.
Among those who died in ICE custody or under its supervision are detainees who died “from heart-related issues”; drug addicts who “suffered organ failures”; and by suicide. 52 people from such high-risk populations as 3rd world countries rife with disease, drugs, and the mentally ill amount to .01% of the 473,677 detainees held by ICE from January 2025 – April 2026. For comparison, with a death rate of 903 people per 100,000 in 2024 according to the CDC, 4,290 people among a cross-section of 475,000 Americans are expected to die each year. That’s a mortality rate 90x greater than the migrants detained by ICE.
As for those dying “at the hands of ICE” - Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, Silverio Villegas-Gonzalez, and Renee Nicole Good were neither unarmed nor vulnerable. They refused to comply with the lawful orders of ICE officers, weaponized their vehicles, and ran over those officers or rammed their vehicles. Those officers suffered severe back injuries, lacerations, and internal bleeding after being struck or dragged. Good was a fair, blonde, American, which shows officers react to the deadly threat they face, not race or immigration status.
Thanks to Democrats educating illegals on how to “openly defy ICE” and putting a bullseye on their backs, during President Trump’s first year back in office, such vehicular attacks exploded 3,200%, from 2 to 66; and assaults against ICE officers rose 1,347%, increasing from 19 to 275. Despite the increasing violence against them, ICE officers continue cleaning up the mess created by Democrats’ open-borders, pro-illegal alien policies.
This is something Legislator Gonzalez is intimately familiar with, as the district he’s lived in for the past 20 years (and which I patrolled for 10) gained national prominence as an MS-13 stronghold in 2016 with the murders of 16-year-old Kayla Cuevas and 15-year-old Nisa Mickens. At that time, MS-13 was responsible for nine murders in Brentwood and 30 across Long Island since 2010. Brentwood became ground zero for MS-13 due to the thousands of unaccompanied minors from Central America placed there after hundreds of thousands flooded America due to the actions and inactions of President Obama and democrats.
During a 2017 speech in Brentwood, President Trump vowed to “destroy the vile criminal cartel MS-13”, and by 2019, that gang was rendered “u.” Thanks to the subsequent coordinated efforts of the Suffolk County Police, prosecutors, and federal agencies, when Gonzalez became a legislator in 2019, he inherited a district safe from MS-13. While MS-13 can no longer terrorize Latino communities across Long Island, four years of Biden’s open borders policies allowed millions of illegals into America, free to terrorize communities across the country.
Where are the public statements about “protecting life and respecting the dignity of every person” from Democrats like Gonzalez when illegals rape, kill, and murder American citizens as well as those in their own immigrant communities? Americans like 22-year-old University of Georgia Nursing student Laken Riley who was murdered in February 2024 by a Venezuelan illegal alien while she was out for a jog; Pennsylvania State Trooper Michael Pahira who was run over in July 2026 by an illegal alien from Haiti that was granted a CDL from democrat’s sanctuary state Massachusetts; or the vulnerable American female Uber passenger in Miami raped by an illegal alien from Cuba in June 2026?
In the past year, ICE has tracked down and arrested 11 illegals convicted of sex crimes in Suffolk County, many of whom targeted children. How many public statements has Legislator Gonzalez made calling for “full accountability” on the democrat policies that brought those predators here?
Just as every officer who breaks the law should be held accountable, so should every public official whose policies have led to Americans being victimized by illegal migrants.
Sadly, those “unarmed and vulnerable” victims' lives don’t seem to matter because they don’t fit the anti-law and order, pro-criminal and chaos narrative of the Democrat Party.
Democrats’ anti-ICE crusade is Black Lives Matter (BLM) 2.0. Same old misleading use of statistics, portraying criminals as innocent victims, demonizing law enforcement, and accusations of racism.
The only differences are that, rather than attacking local police, federal officers are in their crosshairs. And instead of black people, they are crying racism against illegal immigrants.
Mike Simonelli is a retired Suffolk County Police Officer, U.S. Army Combat Veteran, and author of Justified Deadly Force and the Myth of Systemic Racism.
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