Before all that went on, Trump’s acting Customs and Border Protection (CBP) commissioner, John Sanders, resigned following outcry over the treatment of children in detention centres like that at Clint.
In a message to employees, Sanders said he would step down on 5 July. He did not give a reason for leaving.
“Although I will leave it to you to determine whether I was successful, I can unequivocally say that helping support the amazing men and women of CBP has been the most fulfilling and satisfying opportunity of my career,” he said.
President Trump moved quickly to wash his hands of Sanders, denying they had ever spoken.
Hours after the departure was announced, two officials told The Associated Press that he was being replaced by Mark Morgan, who was named acting director of ICE just last month.
In an interview last week, Sanders blamed the problems in detention on a lack of money and called on Congress to pass its $4.5bn emergency funding bill to address the crisis (as the House of Representatives duly did last night).
While activists welcomed Sanders’ departure, Trump defended US border authorities, saying, “The laws are so bad and the asylum rules and laws are so bad that our Border Patrol people, who are so incredible, aren’t allowed to do their jobs.”
The unprecedented surge of migrant families has left US immigration detention centers severely overcrowded and taxed the government’s ability to provide medical care and other attention. Six children have died since September after being detained by border agents.
After he was picked to lead ICE, Morgan, the new acting director, showed a willingness to deport families during enforcement sweeps.
However, past Trump immigration officials hesitated over concerns about logistics and the public’s reaction.
The human costs of the migrant surge were driven home this week by a searing photo of the bodies of a Salvadoran man and his nearly two-year-old daughter, face down in shallow water along the Mexican side of the Rio Grande. On Sunday, two babies, a toddler and a woman were found dead on the Texas side, overcome by the sweltering heat.
Trump insists he is “very concerned” about conditions at the border but claimed without evidence that things are “much better than they were under President Obama, by far” and in “much better shape than it ever was” – an assertion immigration activists said is simply not true.
“We did not have the kind of overcrowded conditions for unaccompanied kids in Border Patrol holding cells like we saw in Clint,” said Michael Bochenek, a lawyer from Human Rights Watch.
Previously CBP’s chief operating officer, Sanders was named acting commissioner in April after the agency’s previous leader, Kevin McAleenan, became acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security following the resignation of Kirstjen Nielsen. Other key DHS agencies also have interim or acting directors, including US Immigration and Customs Enforcement and US Citizenship and Immigration Services, adding to the growing sense of administrative turmoil.
Morgan, who also served as chief of the Border Patrol, a subsidiary of CBP, under President Barack Obama, is now expected to be replaced as ICE’s acting leader by Matthew Albence.
Albence served as acting director earlier this year after the departure of another former leader, Ronald Vitiello.
