Democrats who spent months championing an undocumented New Jersey man’s release from ICE detention are now under fresh scrutiny after reporting from The Daily Wire linked him to a domestic violence arrest — with one of the state’s own congresswomen going ahead and honoring him at a public event just days after those records surfaced.
According to The Daily Wire, Rep. Nellie Pou staged a legislative dinner Thursday celebrating the end of Hispanic Heritage Month, where she called Martin Soto and his wife Gabriela to the podium as “special guests” and handed them a letter. The event came the same week The Daily Wire published police records showing Soto was first arrested by Kearny police on Feb. 1 for allegedly violently assaulting his wife, before ICE took him into custody the next day from the Hudson County jail.
A public embrace in the face of damning records
At the dinner, Pou praised the couple in personal terms. “I cannot imagine, I cannot imagine what those months were like for Martin and for Gabriela and their children. No family, no family should have to endure what they went through. No family,” she said, per The Daily Wire, which attended the event.
Pou went on to recount her office’s efforts to secure the release of Soto, who had been detained at Delaney Hall in Newark. “My office is proud to say that we worked very hard for months to secure Martin’s release,” she said. “I worked very closely with so many different advocates, with many of my other colleagues, both Congressman Menendez and Congresswoman McIver and Congresswoman Analilia Mejia.”
The representative also singled out Gabriela for praise, calling her “an unbelievable individual” and “una mujer bien poderosa,” crediting her for speaking out publicly and refusing to “give up” on her husband’s release.
“Martin, we are so very happy to see that you are finally home with your family,” Pou continued, according to The Daily Wire. “I know that we are still fighting to ensure that he is permanently released.”
What the police records reportedly say
The reporting hinges on records obtained by the Oversight Project and reviewed by The Daily Wire. According to those documents, Soto allegedly “purposely” caused “bodily injury” to a victim “specifically by using his hands, both opened and closed to strike” her “in her face, causing minor scratches and cuts to her face and neck,” then “placed a hand over” her “mouth so she could not scream for help.”
The most recent police report redacted the victim’s name in all but one place, where it identified her as “Ms. Soto,” The Daily Wire reported. It also identified the victim as the daughter of “Mr. Gabriel Osores” — Gabriela’s maiden name.
Officers had responded to a “domestic violence” call at the couple’s home, where the alleged beating took place with children present, according to the report. The account also describes an altercation involving Gabriela’s father, who at one point told Soto he “must leave the house.” Responding officers called EMS over injuries to an unidentified individual and to Soto himself, who was described as bleeding from the nose and a lip, with scratches across his abdomen. He refused medical aid.
A city official in Kearny later told The Daily Wire the assault case was expunged. ICE has previously confirmed it took Martin into custody on Feb. 2 after the assault charge, and accused him of participating “in inciting unrest and causing property damage” while held at Delaney Hall.
The ‘abduction’ narrative collapses
For months, Democrats and advocacy groups rallied around the Sotos’ version of events: that Martin was illegally “abducted” by federal agents while buying diapers for the couple’s infant son. The story fueled protests, media coverage and a GoFundMe campaign that raised more than $67,000 on his behalf while he was detained.
Gabriela, meanwhile, told The Daily Wire in July that the stress of her husband’s detention had caused her to suffer a miscarriage.
Soto walked free from an ICE detention facility in Elizabeth on Oct. 6, where he had been transferred in May, after a Biden-appointed federal judge granted his habeas petition claiming wrongful detention. Reps. Mejia and Rob Menendez greeted him outside the facility; Gabriela was there as well.
His attorney, Selenia DeStefani, has filed an application for a U visa — normally reserved for victims of crime — over what she characterizes as her client’s mistreatment by ICE. The New Jersey Department of Labor certified the application. DeStefani has denied that Soto has a criminal record, insisting that “he is the victim of a crime, not the perpetrator of one.”
Gabriela denied the allegations outright when The Daily Wire first asked her about them, saying the police documents contained her husband’s information but that the underlying claims were false. “My husband NEVER hit me,” she said. “I even have proof from pictures and selfies I had taken that week and I do not have no bodily injury.” She added that Martin “never got arrested by Kearny PD” and that he left the house the afternoon of Feb. 1.
Neither Pou’s office nor the offices of the other New Jersey Democrats who backed Soto — including Sens. Cory Booker and Andy Kim, and Reps. Analilia Mejía and Bonnie Watson Coleman — responded to requests for comment from The Daily Wire, leaving the door open for them to walk back their support in light of the newly surfaced records.
Soto’s case has become a flashpoint in a broader national fight over immigration enforcement, detention conditions and how quickly elected officials embrace viral stories that fit a preferred political narrative. For Pou, who publicly linked arms with the couple at a celebratory dinner, the timing of the honor — coming days after the police records became public — could complicate her position as the story continues to develop.
Source: www.dailywire.com — https://www.dailywire.com/news/dems-honor-wife-beating-illegal-immigrant-after-lies-exposed