Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen has tapped Manuel Padilla, a 30-year Border Patrol veteran, as the head of a new, temporary front that will serve as the coordinator of the department’s response to the “border crisis.”
DHS announced late Tuesday the creation of an interagency border emergency cell. Padilla is responsible for improving the sharing of information and coordinating support among DHS agencies, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Customs and Border Protection, Citizenship and Immigration Services, and others.
“I want to be clear with the American people: there is an unprecedented emergency at the southern border, and DHS is leading a true government-wide emergency response,” Nielsen said in a statement.
Trump was reported Monday to be considering naming an immigration czar to his staff, though no announcements have been made. It’s not clear if Padilla will interact with the White House, though his position is separate from the czar role.
Padilla is being temporarily reassigned from his post as the director of the DHS Joint Task Force West, which President Trump appointed him to last September. He was previously the chief of Border Patrol’s busiest sector on the southern border, the Rio Grande Valley in Texas.
He is headed to the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s National Response Coordination Center in Washington for his assignment.
“Manny brings deep on-the-ground experience and an operator’s understanding of the challenges we face in responding to the current crisis,” Nielsen said.
Nielsen is in Europe this week for the G7 Interior Ministers’ Meeting in Paris, but is scheduled to visit Calexico, Calif., with President Trump on Friday.
