Born in November 1957 in New York City, Janet Ann Napolitano was raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and Albuquerque, New Mexico. She earned a bachelor’s degree from Santa Clara University and a Juris Doctor from the University of Virginia School of Law. In 1991, while a partner with the private Phoenix law firm Lewis and Roca LLP, Napolitano provided legal representation for Anita Hill as the latter testified, before the U.S. Senate, that Clarence Thomas, whom President George H.W. Bush had nominated to serve as a Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court, had sexually harassed her a decade earlier when she was Thomas’ subordinate at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. In the confirmation proceedings, Hill’s witness Susan Hoerchner, suddenly became unable to remember parts of her story that contradicted Hill. Napolitano subsequently refused to answer questions whether she had persuaded Hoerchner to change her testimony.

In 1993, President Bill Clinton appointed Napolitano to be United States Attorney for the District of Arizona. After California voters in 1996 passed the California Civil Rights Initiative (Proposition 209) which barred racial and ethnic preferences in university admissions, Napolitano derided the measure as a “legal barrier” to “diversity.”

From 1999-2003, Napolitano served as attorney general of Arizona. During her tenure in that position, her office banned Christmas displays on public property.

In 2002 Napolitano ran successfully as the Democratic Party candidate for Arizona governor. She was reelected four years later. As governor, Napolitano vetoed seven bills intended to fight illegal immigration.

In November 2008, President-elect Barack Obama named Napolitano for the post of U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security.

As Arizona governor, Napolitano in 2003 vetoed House Bill 2345, which was designed to curb voter fraud by requiring voters to present a driver’s license or two forms of identification when casting their ballots. According to Napolitano, such a law would disenfranchise “poor voters” and thus would violate the civil rights of legal Latino citizens. She also supported a proposal to grant driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants.

In August 2005 Napolitano took a measure ostensibly intended to curb illegal immigration, declaring a “state of emergency” along Arizona’s border with Mexico, a move that cleared the way for the National Guard to block illegal entry into the United States. In July 2007, she signed an employer-sanctions law that made it a crime for businesses to hire illegal immigrants.

But as Republican State Senator Linda Gray noted, “The legislature appropriated money for our National Guard to be at the border and [Napolitano] did not use the funds.” “The major reason she signed the employer-sanction bill,” Gray added, “was because she didn’t want the harsher initiative that was headed for the ballot…. That is hardly someone who is tough on immigration.”

Governor Napolitano supported a Senate bill that, if it had passed, effectively would have granted amnesty to illegal immigrants. Moreover, she vetoed a state bill that would have required police to enforce federal immigration laws, calling it “unnecessary.”

During her first few weeks as DHS Secretary in 2009, Napolitano’s stance on illegal immigration was mixed. On the one hand, she announced her intent to redeploy more than 360 additional officers and agents to the area near the U.S.-Mexico border. She also pledged to supply border-control agents with biometric identification equipment and mobile X-ray units to help them do their job. On the other hand, she delayed a series of proposed immigration raids and other enforcement actions at U.S. workplaces, asking agents in her department to exercise greater sensitivity in their selection and investigation of targets as well as the timing of their raids.

In early 2009 Napolitano claimed that “70 percent of the weapons in the hands of the [Mexican] drug cartels are coming from the U.S.” Contrary to that assertion, however, more than two-thirds of the guns recovered at Mexican crime scenes are never even sent to the U.S. for tracing, because their markings make it obvious that they originated from somewhere else. Moreover, a large number of the recovered weapons lack serial numbers entirely and thus cannot be traced to any location. In the final analysis, a mere 17 percent of all the guns in question can actually be traced to America.

In April 2009, Napolitano’s DHS released a report warning that “rightwing extremists may be gaining new recruits by playing on their fears about several emergent issues” such as “the economic downturn,” “the election of the first African American president,” and “the possible passage of new restrictions on firearms.” Particularly susceptible to recruitment, added the report, were military veterans (returning from Iraq and Afghanistan) who faced “significant challenges reintegrating into their communities.” The report summarized:

“Rightwing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements, and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups), and those that are mainly antigovernment, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration.”

From her earliest days as the head of DHS, Napolitano broke with the Department’s tradition of warning the American public about potential terrorist threats. Instead, Napolitano refers to acts of terrorism as “man-caused disasters.” In a 2009 interview with Germany’s Spiegel Online, she was asked whether her avoidance of the term “terrorism” meant that “Islamist terrorism suddenly no longer pos[es] a threat to your country?” She replied: “Of course it does [pose a threat]. I presume there is always a threat from terrorism. In my speech, although I did not use the word ‘terrorism,’ I referred to ‘man-caused’ disasters. That is perhaps only a nuance, but it demonstrates that we want to move away from the politics of fear toward a policy of being prepared for all risks that can occur.” Napolitano expunged the word “terrorism” from the DHS lexicon and purged Department experts who had shown the connection between terrorism and jihad.

In an April 2009 interview with CNN’s John King, Napolitano discussed Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio’s assertion that illegal aliens should be prosecuted and jailed. Said Napolitano:

“Sheriff Joe … knows that there aren’t enough law-enforcement officers, courtrooms or jail cells in the world to do what he is saying. What we have to do is target the real evil-doers in this business, the employers who consistently hire illegal labor, the human traffickers who are exploiting human misery. And yes, when we find illegal workers, yes, appropriate action, some of which is criminal, most of that is civil, because crossing the border is not a crime per se. It is civil. But anyway, going after those as well.”

Contrary to Napolitano’s claim, illegal immigration is indeed a criminal offense under U.S. law.

In November 2009 Napolitano, speaking at the Center for American Progress in Washington, DC, said that the Obama administration would soon push for “immigration reform” by offering illegal aliens in the United States a “tough and fair pathway to earned legal status.” This pathway, she elaborated, “will mandate that illegal immigrants meet a number of requirements—including registering, paying a fine, passing a criminal background check, fully paying all taxes and learning English.” Napolitano said these were “substantial requirements” that would “make sure this [illegal] population gets right with the law,” “help fix our broken system,” and “strengthen our economy.”

In late December 2009, Napoitano sparked controversy with comments she made in the wake of an attempted Christmas Day bombing of a Northwest Airlines flight (from Amsterdam to Detroit) by a Nigerian member of al Qaeda, who had been permitted to board the plane even though his name was in a database of suspected terrorists. When he tried to detonate his chemical bomb (which was powerful enough to blow a hole in the side of a plane), it started a small fire but failed to explode as planned; passengers and crew members rushed to subdue him. Speaking to CNN in the aftermath of the incident, Napolitano said that the system had “worked” from the following standpoint:

“And one thing I’d like to point out is that the system worked. Everybody played an important role here. The passengers and crew of the flight took appropriate action. Within literally an hour to 90 minutes of the incident occurring, all 128 flights in the air had been notified to take some special measures in light of what had occurred on the Northwest Airlines flight. We instituted new measures on the ground and at screening areas, both here in the United States and in Europe, where this flight originated. So the whole process of making sure that we respond properly, correctly and effectively went very smoothly.”

On April 23, 2010, Arizona’s Republican governor, Jan Brewer, signed into law a bill deputizing state police to check with federal authorities on the immigration status of any individuals whom they had stopped for some legitimate reason, if the behavior of those individuals — or the circumstances of the stop — led the officers to suspect that they might be in the United States illegally. In the ensuing days and weeks, Napolitano spoke out forcefully against the “misguided” bill, going on television to criticize it and asserting that it was “bad law-enforcement law.” But under questioning by Senator John McCain during a Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing on May 17,  Napolitano admitted that she had not actually read the bill. “I have not reviewed it in detail. I certainly know of it,” she said when asked by McCain whether she given the language a close look.

In August 2010, the Houston Chronicle reported that Napolitano’s DHS was “systematically reviewing thousands of pending immigration cases and moving to dismiss those filed against suspected illegal immigrants who have no serious criminal records.” ICE Assistant Secretary John Morton estimated that the effort could affect up to 17,000 cases.

In early February 2010, Napolitano told the House Homeland Security Commmittee that the U.S. government had secured “effective control of the great majority” of America’s northern and southern borders. But according to Customs and Border Protection data, as of September 30, 2010, the U.S. government had established “effective control” of only 44 percent (873 miles) of America’s 1,994-mile-long border with Mexico, and only about 2 percent (69 miles) of the approximately 4,000 mile-long northern border with Canada.

In August 2012, James T. Hayes Jr., special agent in charge of New York City investigations for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), filed a lawsuit (in United States District Court for the District of Columbia) against Napolitano, alleging that he (Hayes) was shunted aside so that Napolitano could give a job to a “less qualified woman” with whom she had “enjoyed a long-standing relationship.” That woman was New York City Department of Corrections commissioner Dora Schriro, former head of the Missouri Corrections Department who became director of the Arizona Department of Corrections when Napolitano was governor of that state. The federal complaint also alleged that Napolitano’s handpicked ICE chief of staff, Suzanne Barr, had “created a frat-house type atmosphere that is targeted to humiliate and intimidate male employees.” For details about the lawsuit and the specific allegations, click here.

In March 2013, Napolitano predicted that the influx of Mexican immigrants into Arizona, traditionally a Republican/conservative stronghold, would eventually deliver the state into the hands of the Democratic Party—in a manner similar to what had previously occurred in Nevada, New Mexico, and Colorado. “Arizona will be behind them,” Napolitano told reporters. “I think it will be more purple over time, but ultimately blue.”1

On July 12, 2013, Napolitano announced that she would resign her DHS post in September to take a job as president of the University of California system of ten colleges.

In her first major speech as UC president on October 31, 2013, Napolitano told members of San Francisco’s Commonwealth Club that she would immediately allocate $15 million in non-state funds to support the UC system’s 900-or-so undergraduates, postdoctoral fellows, and graduate students who also were illegal immigrants. Each of these three groups would receive $5 million in support, she said, in the form of trained advisers, student service centers, and financial assistance. Napolitano elaborated: “These Dreamers, as they are often called, are students who would have benefited from a federal DREAM Act. They are students who deserve the opportunity to succeed and to thrive at UC…. Consider this a down payment—one more piece of evidence of our commitment to all Californians. UC will continue to be a vehicle for social mobility. We teach for California; we research for the world.”

Calling for an American “partnership” with Mexico, Napolitano made the University of California a sanctuary system, ruling that UC campus police would not cooperate with federal immigration authorities. She also founded and funded the UC Center for Undocumented Student Legal Services. As a result of UC’s sanctuary policy, the 4,000 or so illegals in the UC system paid the discounted tuition rates that were normally reserved for students who were legal residents of the state of California. Napolitano granted those students a $25.2 million aid package running through 2019.

Meanwhile, Napolitano made no cuts in the UC’s bloated bureaucracy. Instead, she ramped up tuition and fees for the California students whom UC was created to serve, and she secretly amassed a $175 million slush fund which she used to shower perks on overpaid staff and renovate the houses of UC chancellors. In response to her fiscal recklessness, angry students at a UC Regents meeting in 2017 shouted “Arrest Napolitano!” and “Janet must go!” But when the state auditor reported that Napolitano’s office had “intentionally interfered” with their investigators, Democratic Attorney General Xavier Becerra filed no charges.

In September 2017, Napolitano took issue with President Donald Trump’s announcement that he planned to gradually scale back and rescind former President Barack Obama’s “Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals” (DACA) executive order of 2012, by means of which Obama had granted hundreds of thousands of young illegal aliens temporary legal status, work permits, access to certain publicly funded social services, and protection from deportation. But Trump’s plan was, in fact, a greatly watered-down version of the policies he had previously vowed to take with regard to DACA. Specifically, Trump was now stating that he would wind down the program over the ensuing six months, in order to give Congress time “to legalize DACA” in the form of legislation that he could sign. “I am not going to just cut DACA off,” said Trump, “but rather provide a window of opportunity for Congress to finally act.” Trump’s proposal also allowed any DACA beneficiaries whose permits were slated to expire before March 5, 2018, an opportunity to apply for a two-year renewal.

But even this weak approach by Trump was deemed excessively harsh by Napolitano, who had been one of the original architects of the DACA program. On September 16, 2017, the University of California sued the Trump administration for allegedly violating the rights of “undocumented” students. The University’s complaint read: “As a result of the defendants’ actions, the Dreamers face expulsion from the only country that they call home, based on nothing more than unreasoned executive whim. The University faces the loss of vital members of its community, students and employees. It is hard to imagine a decision less reasoned, more damaging, or undertaken with less care. … Defendants’ capricious rescission of the DACA program violates both the procedural and substantive requirements of the APA (Administrative Procedure Act), as well as the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment.”

Napolitano, for her part, said in a statement: “It is imperative … that we stand up for these vital members of the UC community. They represent the best of who we are — hard working, resilient and motivated high achievers. To arbitrarily and capriciously end the DACA program, which benefits our country as a whole, is not only unlawful, it is contrary to our national values and bad policy.” Moreover, Napolitano pledged that UC campuses would continue to provide services for students who were in the United States illegally, including: free legal services; tuition discounts for in-state residents; financial aid via the DREAM loan program; and assurances that campus police would not be permitted to contact, detain, question or arrest individuals based on their legal status, or to take any actions that might lead to the arrest of any student for federal immigration law violations.

In September 2019, Napolitano announced that she would step down from her post as UC president after the 2019-20 academic year.

NOTE:

1 “Blue” states are majority-Democrat, “red” states are majority-Republican, and “purple” states are more evenly divided between the two parties.

Additional Resources:

Janet Napolitano Departs the University of California
By Lloyd Billingsley
September 24, 2019