The Latest Development in the Long-Running Mayorkas/Edwards Feud
Once upon a time, during the Obama administration, there was a feud between two DHS officials of about the same rank, Alejandro Mayorkas, then director of USCIS, and Floyd Edwards, then acting DHS inspector general.
Edwards complained about how Mayorkas handled an EB-5 investor-visa matter (as outlined here in the liberal publication Vox). That has since disappeared as an issue.
Edwards was said to have stationed his own wife, an IG official, in India for a year, at which time she tackled a family financial matter (an odd arrangement) and Edwards was said to have adjusted his travel schedule to fit with some PhD classes at a marginal university in Florida.
Mayorkas, a multiple political appointee, since then moved up to be deputy secretary of DHS under Obama, and is currently the secretary.
Edwards, a civil servant, never became full inspector general, drifted to another position within DHS, then went into consulting, and has been charged by the Department of Justice with the theft of government-owned intellectual property.
In recent developments, Edwards (and two other ex-DHS employees) were sentenced for the theft of the software that involved personal information on some 200,000 employees of DHS and the Postal Service; they planned on selling the software to other government agencies (just how they could have pulled this off is not explained).
Edwards, who pleaded guilty, got 18 months in prison time to be followed by two years of supervised release, all according to a DoJ press release.
Mayorkas is in a different kind of trouble dealing with government policy. The House of Representatives has moved articles of impeachment against him, accusing him of breaking the immigration law through his handling of Biden’s overall immigration policies.
Though the House Republicans may be able to vote impeachment against him, confirmation of the charges and removal from office would have to secure a two-thirds vote in the Senate, an unlikely outcome.
