Alejandro Mayorkas was born on November 24, 1959 in Havana (Cuba). This is the Secretary of the US Department of Homeland Security starting in 2021. He served as a federal prosecutor and held other high-level federal positions during the administration of President Barack Obama (2009-17). In January 2024, the House of Representatives, with a Republican majority, presented a indictment against Mayorkas, accused of violating federal immigration laws and allowing the release of thousands of illegal immigrants after entering the country illegally through the U.S.-Mexico border. It did not prosper. But, He became the second member of the president’s cabinet to be impeached by the House.. On April 17, the Democratic-controlled Senate rejected the charges without holding a trial.
Havana
Alejandro Mayorkas was born in Havana in November 1959.. Mayorkas’ mother, Anita Gabor, was a Romanian Jew. His family had emigrated to Cuba in the 1940s after fleeing to France to escape the Holocaust. In Cuba, he met his father, Carlos Mayorkas, a Jew born in Cuba. His parents were of Turkish and Polish origin. At the time of Alejandro’s birth, his father owned a steel wool factory outside of Havana. In 1960, the family (including Mayorkas’ older sister Cathy) moved to Miami, as did many other Cubans concerned about their future under the revolutionary government of Fidel Castro, which eventually transformed Cuba into a communist dictatorship. The family moved to Beverly Hills, California, where one of his father’s cousins had offered him a job as an accountant at a textile company.
Alejandro Mayorkas graduated from the University of California, Berkeley (1981). After in Law at Loyola Law SchoolLos Angeles (1985). He was appointed federal prosecutor in 1998 by President Bill Clinton. He was criticized for his alleged role in an attempt to secure a pardon from President Clinton for the son of a wealthy Democratic Party donor who was serving a prison sentence for drug trafficking. Mayorkas said his contacts on the matter were for informational purposes only.
Mayorkas worked in private practice during the presidency of George W. Bush (2001-09). In 2009, President Barack Obama appointed him director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.a division of the Department of Homeland Security. Mayorkas was praised for the rapid implementation of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA)among other achievements. He was accused of intervening in a visa program on behalf of wealthy foreign investors. He visited Cuba in 2015, part of a broader effort by the Obama administration to overhaul U.S. relations with that country.
Mayorkas returned to private practice during the presidency of Donald Trump (2017-21). In November 2020, he was nominated by then-President-elect Joe Biden to lead the Department of Homeland Security, which includes the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Under Mayorkas, the Biden administration scaled back Trump’s plans to build the wall on the border with Mexico. Instead, he focused on building a virtual wall high technology.
