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Border Patrol Leader Mark Morgan and Alternate Carla Provost testify in November 2016 at a hearing of the Standing Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs. (Alex Brandon / AP)
Nick Miroff
Journalist in charge of law enforcement in immigration, drug trafficking and national security
President Trump announced Sunday that he had chosen Mark Morgan to head the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, surprising the agency's top leaders.
"I am pleased to inform all those who believe in a strong, fair and solid immigration policy that Mark Morgan will join the Trump administration at the helm of our ICE workers," wrote Trump in a tweet. "Mark is a true American believer and patriot. He will do a good job!
The leaders of the CIE did not know that Trump had chosen Morgan and had learned the decision of the tweet of the president, according to two officials of the administration.
"The ICE leaders had not been warned of Morgan's selection before the tweet," said a senior administration official.
Morgan, an FBI career manager who served as the director of customs and border protection at the end of the Obama administration, has publicly spoken out for Trump's efforts to build a wall along the border with Mexico.
It was not clear immediately if Trump had officially appointed Morgan to the position, which requires confirmation by the Senate.
Morgan had been forced to withdraw from CBP at the beginning of the Trump administration. But he later emerged as a supporter of the administration and said that he believed the wall was an important part of national security, saying in an interview that "the wall works."
He urged Trump to push for funding of the border wall despite opposition from lawmakers.
"I've been kidnapped. I get up and say, "I'd have some disdain for them, but I do not have them because they're right," Morgan told the Law and Crime website in January. "I can stand up and say that they are right because it is the right thing to do for this country.I beg the president to stay the course."
Last month, Trump withdrew the candidacy of Ronald Vitiello, a 30-year veteran of the US Border Patrol, then top official of ICE, claiming that he wanted his job to be "more difficult."
"Ron is a good man," Trump told reporters at the time. "But we are going in a more difficult direction. We want to go in a more difficult direction. "
The president's decision on Vitiello was such a surprise that some US officials apparently thought the White House had made a clerical mistake.
But Trump's support for Vitiello has declined after complaints from Stephen Miller, the White House's Hawkeye advisor who is leading the administration's immigration policy efforts, the Washington Post reported at the time.
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