State Official Tops Candidate Roster for INS Western Post

Ben Davidian, the chairman of the California Agriculture Labor Relations Board, is the leading candidate to succeed Harold Ezell as the top federal immigration official in the West, a Justice Department spokesman said Thursday.

David Runkel, chief spokesman for U.S. Atty. Gen. Dick Thornburgh, said Davidian, a 38-year-old GOP activist and longtime supporter of California Gov. George Deukmejian, is being seriously considered for nomination as Western regional commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. Davidian is a former Sacramento lawyer with admittedly no experience in the complicated and politically charged immigration field.

A nominee for the key Western post could be named before the confirmation of a permanent successor to ousted INS Commissioner Alan Nelson, the agency’s top official.

“His (Davidian’s) naming will be sooner rather than later,” Runkel said, in response to questions during a telephone interview.

Gene McNary, the chief elected official of St. Louis County, Mo., has been reported for several months as the Bush Administration’s choice to replace Nelson, but he has not yet been formally nominated.

Runkel declined further comment, but other ranking officials within the Justice Department, which oversees the INS, said Davidian in recent days has leapfrogged over a Republican Latino from Orange County, former Yorba Linda City Councilman Rudolph Castro, as the apparent choice to succeed the flamboyant Ezell, whose pro forma resignation as INS Western regional commissioner was accepted Monday.

“He’s impressed a lot of people that he would be a good political appointment,” one INS official said.

The post is a key one since the immigration agency is in the midst of handling the second phase of the 1986 amnesty law. More than 60% of the 3 million immigrants who applied for legal resident status are in the INS’ Western region, which includes California, Arizona, Nevada, Hawaii and the Pacific island of Guam.

Davidian, a Fresno native whose paternal forebearers came from Armenia, has been chairman of the politically sensitive ALRB for the last 2 1/2 years.

He was appointed by Deukmejian during a time that conservatives and growers complained that the quasi-judicial, five-member panel was too sympathetic to complaints filed by the United Farm Workers of America.

Complete Turnaround

Since that time, farm-labor advocates have charged that the board has made a complete turnabout and has not supported UFW-initiated elections for representation.

Union officials, who did not respond to phone calls late Thursday, have said they do not bother to file complaints with the state panel, now dominated by Deukmejian appointees, because of its alleged bias against farm workers.

The ALRB, created in 1975, considers cases of unfair labor practices and disputes surrounding farm union-representation elections.

Reached by telephone in Sacramento, Davidian confirmed that he has sought appointment within the Bush Administration, but said he did not know if the INS post was among the jobs he was being considered for.

“I would be honored to serve in the Bush Administration,” said Davidian, who has worked in the campaigns for Deukmejian, former President Ronald Reagan and other Republicans.

Davidian said his lack of first-hand experience in immigration policy should not be considered a handicap.

“The criticism of me (when he was named to the ALRB) was the fact that I had no agriculture and labor law background,” he said. “But an individual like me can come in with a clean slate and no preconceived notions. That’s why I was appointed.”

But that was of little comfort for immigrant-rights advocates, who contended that a career INS officer was better suited for the post.

“I think Davidian would be a serious mistake,” said attorney Peter Schey of the National Center for Immigrant Rights Inc. in Los Angeles. “It would give us several more years of INS leadership by persons or a person unfamiliar with immigration laws and policies.”

Supporters of Davidian, however, said the one-time Air Force captain is ideally suited for the post.

“He has the kind of personality that can bring different factions together,” San Diego attorney Pat Shea said. “He doesn’t have the exotic personality of the predecessor.”