Kirstjen Nielsen was appointed to rejoin the Trump administration, marking her return since she stepped down as secretary of the Department of Homeland Security six months prior.
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by Jason Hopkins Kirstjen Nielsen will officially vacate her position atop the Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday, leaving Kevin McAleenan as the acting head. President Donald Trump, frustrated over the growing immigration crisis on the U.S. southern border, accepted Nielsen’s resignation after meeting with her at the White House on Sunday. The president went on to announce that McAleenan, the current commissioner of Customs and Border Protection (CBP), will be taking over her position in an acting capacity. Who is McAleenan and how will he likely manage the surge of illegal migrant crisis? The soon-to-be DHS secretary touts nearly two decades of experience working in immigration enforcement. A graduate of the University of Chicago Law School, McAleenan worked for some time as an attorney in California. The Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, however, prompted him to apply for the FBI, but he ended up working in what is now CBP. He quickly moved up the ranks under both the Bush and Obama administrations. McAleenan was the port director for the Los Angeles International Airport and he served as the executive director of CBP’s antiterrorism office. He was appointed by former President Barack Obama as deputy commissioner of CBP in 2014, and he was awarded the…
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by Chuck Ross President Donald Trump announced Sunday that Kirstjen Nielsen is resigning as secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, bringing an end to an at-times rocky relationship between the two. Trump said on Twitter that Kevin McAleenan, the current commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, will take over as acting homeland security secretary. The announcement came shortly after Nielsen met with Trump privately at the White House to discuss her future. Trump and Nielsen have battled behind the scenes over the administration’s immigration policy and efforts to build a wall on the southern border. That tension reached its breaking point in the days after Trump abruptly pulled the nomination of Ronald Vitiello to head U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen will be leaving her position, and I would like to thank her for her service…. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 7, 2019 ….I am pleased to announce that Kevin McAleenan, the current U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner, will become Acting Secretary for @DHSgov. I have confidence that Kevin will do a great job! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 7, 2019 Trump said he wanted to go with someone “tougher”…
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by Jason Hopkins Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen is requesting Congress pass a legislative measure that gives her department greater authority to address the growing migrant crisis at the U.S. southern border. Nielsen asked lawmakers to make it easier for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to deport unaccompanied alien children (UAC), to allow migrants to file asylum requests within their home countries, and for the authority to keep families requesting asylum in detention facilities until their cases are complete, according to a letter first obtained by NBC News. The measures would help alleviate what Nielsen describes as an “emergency situation” at the U.S.-Mexico border. “We are grappling with a humanitarian and security catastrophe that is worsening by the day, and the Department has run out of capacity, despite extraordinary intra-Departmental and interagency efforts,” Nielsen’s letter to Congress read. “Accordingly, DHS requests immediate Congressional assistance to stabilize the situation.” The requests come as the country’s southern border is witnessing record levels of illegal border crossings. The DHS apprehended 50,000 to 60,000 illegal migrants a month in late 2018. More than 75,000 apprehensions and encounters were made in February — the highest volume in over 10 years. DHS forecasts March…
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by Gavin Hanson An official from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) reportedly said the department had not picked up on any indications of successful election cyberattacks as of early Wednesday morning. The 2018 midterm election came and passed without any official observations of hacking, according to the DHS, The Hill reported. This, however, doesn’t rule out that such a cyberattack could still be discovered or happen at a later time. “We’ve not seen, or we’re not aware, of any successful cybersecurity-related compromises of election infrastructure,” a DHS official told journalists during a press call. “At this time we have no indication of compromise to our nation’s election infrastructure that would prevent voting, change vote counts, or distrust the ability to tally votes,” Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen said during a Tuesday press conference. The day before the election, the FBI released a joint statement with the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the DHS about the security of the midterms. The statement also said that although foreign states continue to push propaganda and division on social media, there is “no indication of compromise” to the election itself. ” … Americans should be aware that foreign actors —…
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Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen on Tuesday backed President Donald Trump’s account of last week’s White House meeting in which he reportedly used the word to describe certain Third World countries. Nielsen testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee that she does not recall Trump using that word.
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