Bernie Moreno confronts Toledo commissioner Pete Gerken over ICE remarks

FIRST ON FOX: Republican Sen. Bernie Moreno of Ohio is demanding solutions from a Toledo County commissioner after the official in contrast ICE officers to terrorists, which Moreno prompt may violate his oath of workplace.

“Since December 2025, these companies have gone from a professional company to a terrorist group,” stated Commissioner Pete Gerken said earlier this week because the Lucas County Board of Commissioners voted towards implementing a grant to fund DHS.

In a letter to Gerken, obtained by Fox Information Digital, Moreno referred to as the vote “incoherent and harmful” and labeled Gerken’s feedback as opposite to the oath he took as commissioner.

“Your irresponsible rhetoric and selections are fully inconsistent with the duties to which you took a constitutional oath,” Moreno wrote. “In truth, for instance, it’s your obligation to ‘work with all county elected officers and with judges to make sure that they’re adequately funded to hold out their statutory duties.’ Ohio Revised Code 3.07 states that ‘any particular person holding any workplace… on this county… who refuses or willfully neglects to implement the legislation or carry out any official responsibility imposed on him by legislation… is responsible of misconduct in workplace.’”

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Federal legislation enforcement officers detain a protester throughout a raid in south Minneapolis, Minnesota, U.S., on Tuesday, January 13, 2026. (Photographer: Victor J. Blue/Bloomberg by way of Getty Photographs)

In accordance with the letter, Toledo Public Faculties faces a finances shortfall of an estimated $70 million, whereas the Lucas County Sheriff’s Workplace has requested a $6.57 million finances improve to deal with staffing shortages. Moreno argued that rejecting federal support underneath these circumstances was “significantly complicated” and dangerous to county residents.

Moreno, elected to the U.S. Senate in 2024, additionally accused Gerken of doubling down on his feedback slightly than apologizing, citing the commissioner’s public assertion that he didn’t consider the county ought to settle for cash from “a corporation that has delegitimized itself.”

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Ohio Senator Bernie Moreno. (Eric Lee/Bloomberg by way of Getty Photographs)

Within the letter, Moreno warned that rhetoric labeling federal legislation enforcement officers as “terrorists” is contributing to real-world violence, pointing to assaults on ICE and Border Patrol personnel and a rise in assaults on federal brokers throughout the nation.

“Your disgusting assertion and determination to defund essential prison justice and security infrastructure in Lucas County shouldn’t be solely disgraceful,” Moreno wrote, “however will seemingly result in elevated violence towards legislation enforcement personnel.”

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The senator additionally accused Gerken of hypocrisy, noting that the commissioner had beforehand urged then-President Trump to “be respectful of the area people,” whereas now publicly discrediting federal officers who “sacrifice a lot to implement our legal guidelines and maintain our communities protected.”

Finally, Moreno requested Gerken to reply to a sequence of questions over the following 5 days, together with how a lot of Lucas County’s finances comes from federal funds, whether or not calling federal legislation enforcement officers “terrorists” is constant together with his duties, and whether or not county residents profit from the denial of federal support.

Fox Information Digital contacted Gerken for remark.

As elected Democrats throughout the nation proceed to lash out towards ICE brokers within the wake of the taking pictures of Renee Good in Minneapolis, DHS advised Fox Information Digital this week that there was a 1,300% improve in assaults on brokers and an 8,000% improve in loss of life threats.