recently called on Lehigh County to evict Homeland Security Investigations, a component of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, from county-owned office space<\/a>. He cited years of unpaid rent by the federal government and argued the county had a moral obligation to sever ties with an agency he said has \u201cterrorized migrant communities and their neighbors under the Trump administration.\u201d<\/p>\nShortell pressed Pinsley on whether the move amounted to political grandstanding, given the timing of the announcement and his run for Congress.<\/p>\n
Pinsley said the overdue rent alone justified eviction, regardless of political considerations.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd you pointed to the overdue rent as justification, like, even if you don\u2019t agree with this,\u201d Shortell said. \u201cThey, they still owe us years of rent.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI, so yes, I mean, like the fact that they haven\u2019t paid their bill, 100%, they should be evicted,\u201d Pinsley said. \u201cThere\u2019s been plenty of time to solve for that.\u201d<\/p>\n
But Pinsley went further, arguing that ICE never should have been housed in county facilities at all. Speaking in his role as controller, he said the presence of federal immigration enforcement undermines trust between county government and residents, particularly immigrants.<\/p>\n
\u201cI actually don\u2019t believe that we should have ever let them in in the first place,\u201d Pinsley said. <\/p>\n
\u201cI do believe that there should be a separation between the federal government and the county government, so that like our public doesn\u2019t see us, because we have to see them as residents, not citizens, right?\u201d<\/p>\n
“I do believe that there should be a separation between the federal government and the county government.”<\/p>\n
Mark Pinsley<\/p>\n
Pinsley said that separation is critical for public safety.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf somebody is robbed, you know, and they are an immigrant, well, we should still have the police go after whoever robbed them,\u201d he said. \u201cAlternatively, if someone who is an immigrant sees somebody who robbed, who\u2019s robbed, we want them to feel safe coming to the police and reporting that.\u201d<\/p>\n
He acknowledged that his stance has come at a personal cost.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I will tell you, like after, after, my announcement, I got death threats,\u201d Pinsley said. \u201cYou know, so there are people here that are very pro ICE.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked whether his combative posture raises questions about his ability to govern effectively in Washington, Pinsley said the skills required of a county controller differ sharply from those of a member of Congress.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy current position is an individual position,\u201d he said. \u201cMy position is not meant to like work with others in a, like, let\u2019s like let\u2019s push this under the carpet kind of a way, right? Is to bring visibility to it.\u201d<\/p>\n
In Congress, he said, collaboration would be essential.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been, you know, a senior staff member at very large corporations, and that\u2019s how you, that\u2019s how we had to work together,\u201d Pinsley said. \u201cSo I, I feel very confident in being able to work, you know, to build coalitions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Those coalitions, he added, must begin within his own party.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel like the first coalitions you have to build is within the Democratic Party itself, right?\u201d Pinsley said. \u201cBecause we have to get on the same page, and then, you know, work outside of the party.\u201d<\/p>\n
To hear the whole conversation, watch in the video player above or visit the PBS39 YouTube page<\/a> to see a complete list of episodes. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BETHLEHEM, Pa. \u2014 In a Democratic primary for Pennsylvania’s 7th Congressional District crowded with largely untested candidates, Lehigh…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":107366,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154,51655,4015,6192,51656,51657,46519,46520,46521],"class_list":{"0":"post-107365","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bethlehem","8":"tag-bethlehem","9":"tag-bethlehem-headlines","10":"tag-bethlehem-news","11":"tag-lehigh-county-controller-mark-pinsley","12":"tag-lehigh-valley-political-pulse","13":"tag-mark-pinsley","14":"tag-pa-7-democratic-candidates","15":"tag-pa-7-race","16":"tag-pennsylvanias-7th-congressional-district","17":"tag-political-pulse","18":"tag-tom-shortell"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107365","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107365"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107365\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/107366"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}