US Homeland Security chief, Kirstjen Nielsen resigns

The United States Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen, who enforced some of President Donald Trump’s controversial border policies, has resigned.

Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Kevin McAleenan will replace her temporarily, Mr Trump said. Ms Nielsen was responsible for the proposed border wall with Mexico and the separation of migrant families BBC reported.

Her resignation came after the president indicated he wanted to follow a “tougher” immigration policy. He has often accused Ms Nielsen of not being tough enough.

In recent months, illegal crossings from Central America have surged and Mr Trump has threatened to close the Mexico border. He has since backtracked and promised to give Mexico a year to stop drugs and migrants crossing into the US.

The New York Times reported that Ms Nielsen went into a meeting with Mr Trump on Sunday to plan “a way forward” with the border situation. Instead, she was put under pressure to resign from her job, US media say, citing unnamed sources.

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She gave no reason for her departure in her resignation letter, although she said this was “the right time for me to step aside” and said the US “is safer today than when I joined the Administration”.

Ms Nielsen first joined Mr Trump’s administration in January 2017 as an assistant to the former Homeland Security chief John Kelly.

She became Mr Kelly’s deputy when he moved to become White House chief of staff, but returned to lead her former department later that year.

Ms Nielsen defended border policies such as holding children in wire enclosures in the face of strong condemnation and intense questioning by Democrats in Congress.

In June 2018 protesters booed Ms Nielsen as she ate at a Mexican restaurant in Washington DC.

But she brushed off the demonstration, tweeting that she would “work tirelessly” to fix the “broken immigration system”.

Her relationship with Mr Trump is said to have been difficult, although in public she has been loyal to the administration.