Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano told Bill O’Reilly last night that the federal government hasn’t made a decision about whether to investigate if the maid of GOP gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman lied on her employment forms.
But Napolitano did assure O’Reilly’s viewers — at the host’s prodding — that the government “will look at this very seriously.”
Whitman’s maid, Nicky Diaz, has accused Whitman of subjecting her to financial and emotional abuse. The Whitman campaign produced papers which allegedly showed Diaz lied about her ability to work in the country legally. An immigration lawyer has noted that because the I-9 forms the campaign produced aren’t signed, there’s no evidence she looked at the documentation Diaz provided, and a conservative group has called for both Whitman and Diaz to be arrested.
“I think obviously this is ultimately a matter for California voters to decide,” Napolitano said on O’Reilly’s show.
She also touted the Obama administration’s record on immigration enforcement. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Director John Morton and Napolitano yesterday announced that a record number of illegal immigrants were removed in fiscal year 2010.
“I can tell you that our efforts over the past 19 months have resulted in more people being deported who have used bogus social security numbers who have criminal records who have committed crimes than in any other period in our nation’s history,” Napolitano said.
In a statement sent to TPMMuckraker late last month, an ICE spokeswoman said that the agency, as a matter of policy, does not disclose whether it will conduct a specific law enforcement action in the future.
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