The Washington Post - 14.11.2019

A18 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 14 , 2019

liners view him as insufficiently

committed to Trump’s border poli-

cies. His profile at DHS has been

that of a cautious, more managerial

figure, and not a conservative ideo-

logue.

Though DHS includes such dis-

parate agencies as the Coast Guard,

Secret Service and the Federal

Emergency Management Agency,

Trump’s attention to the depart-

ment has centered almost entirely

on its immigration and border-re-

lated components: U.S. Customs

and Border Protection, U.S. Immi-

gration and Customs Enforcement,

and U.S. Citizenship and Immigra-

tion Services.

Wolf, like his predecessors, will

inherit a migration dynamic at the

southern border of the United

States that remains in flux. During

fiscal 2019, which ended Sept. 30,

authorities took nearly 1 million

migrants into custody along the

U.S.-Mexico border, the highest to-

tal since 2007.

After peaking at more than

144,000 detentions in May, arrests

have fallen by two-thirds, the result

of an enforcement crackdown by

the Mexican government as well as

a suite of experimental Trump ad-

ministration deterrent policies ap-

plied to asylum seekers. They in-

clude the “Migrant Protection Pro-

tocols” that require asylum seekers

to return to Mexico while their

claims are processed in U.S. courts,

leaving many to wait for months on

end in squalid camps and danger-

ous Mexican border towns.

Many of the Trump policies are

facing legal challenges in federal

court, and DHS officials say a deci-

sion that takes away enforcement

tools could trigger a new migration

surge.

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will be in the acting roles is unclear.

White House officials say Trump

does not plan to nominate Wolf for

the permanent position, and some

of the immigration restrictionists

who back the president have criti-

cized Wolf ’s prior lobbying work on

behalf of foreign companies that

sought employment visas.

Cuccinelli, the former Virginia

attorney general and conservative

activist, made bitter enemies on

Capitol Hill when he ran a political

action committee that challenged

several GOP incumbents. But plac-

ing Cuccinelli alongside Wolf al-

lows the administration to install

him in an even more central immi-

gration enforcement role, giving

the White House a Trump surro-

gate who is fully at ease on social

media and in front of television

cameras.

One official familiar with the

plan said both Wolf and Cuccinelli

would work on border-related is-

sues, a reflection of the president’s

view of DHS as an immigration

enforcement agency. Cuccinelli is

expected to make the transition to

DHS headquarters in the next few

days, according to one official who

spoke on the condition of anonymi-

ty to describe the internal planning.

Wolf, 43, began his DHS career

with the Transportation Security

Administration and then worked

for the lobbying and consulting

firm Wexler & Walker from 2005 to

2017. He was chief of staff to Nielsen
      during last year’s failed “Zero Toler-
      ance” border crackdown that led to
      the separation of at least 2,700 chil-
      dren from their parents. Democrats
      who voted against Wolf cited his
      role in the episode.
      Despite that record, and Trump
      immigration adviser Stephen Mill-
      er’s support for Wolf, some hard-

BY NICK MIROFF

Chad Wolf was sworn in Wednes-

day as the new acting secretary of

the Department of Homeland Secu-

rity, becoming the fifth person to

hold the top job under President

Trump, a period of unusually high

leadership turnover at the nation’s

largest domestic security agency.

Wolf will be joined at DHS head-

quarters by Ken Cuccinelli, the act-

ing director of U.S. Citizenship and

Immigration Services, who will

move into the acting deputy secre-

tary role, according to two adminis-

tration officials familiar with the

plans.

Cuccinelli had been Trump’s pre-

ferred choice for the top job, but

Senate Majority Leader Mitch Mc-

Connell (R-Ky.) dislikes Cuccinelli,

and senior Republican senators

have indicated that they will not

confirm him for a permanent job.

Wolf replaces Kevin McAleenan,

who assumed the acting DHS chief

role when Trump removed Kirstjen

Nielsen in April. Mc Aleenan re-

ceived the president’s praise but

was never nominated for the job,

and he submitted his resignation

Oct. 11.

The White House then struggled

to find a candidate to replace Mc -

Aleenan, because so many of the

other top positions at DHS remain

vacant or have interim leaders who

lack Senate confirmation.

Wolf cleared a key hurdle

Wednesday when senators voted 54

to 41 to confirm him for a different

job, DHS undersecretary for strate-

gy, plans and policy. That vote,

largely along party lines, allowed

him to move into the top role at

DHS, which has 240,000 employ-

ees and a $50 billion budget.

How long Wolf and Cuccinelli

Wolf is sworn in as acting DHS chief

BY NICK MIROFF

Jared Kushner and other se-

nior Trump administration offi-

cials are planning to set up web

cameras to live-stream construc-

tion of President Trump’s border

wall, going against objections

from the U.S. Army Corps of

Engineers and senior U.S. Cus-

toms and Border Protection offi-

cials, according to four people

familiar with the White House

proposal.

“There will be a wall cam, and

it’ll launch early next year,” said a

senior White House official in-

volved in the initiative, which

aims to rally public support for

hundreds of miles of new border

barrier Trump wants in place by

next year’s election.

The project, which already has

cost $10 billion in taxpayer funds,

is behind schedule and faces ma-

jor hurdles, including the need to

acquire miles of privately held

land in Texas where barriers are

slated to be built.

Kushner floated the idea dur-

ing meetings in July, part of a

messaging effort to push back

against criticism that Trump has

failed to deliver on the signature

proposal of his 2016 campaign.

The Army Corps and CBP have

told Kushner that construction

contractors do not want their

proprietary techniques visible to

competitors, according to four

people who spoke on the condi-

tion of anonymity to describe the

internal discussions.

Officials at the Army Corps and

CBP also were concerned the

cameras would show U.S. work

crews violating Mexican sover-

eignty because they sometimes

must stray south of the border to

maneuver their vehicles and

heavy equipment in the desert.

Because some of the remote bor-

der areas lack network access, the

cameras will require their own

web connectivity and attendants

who could frequently reposition

them to keep the lens pointed at

the action.

Kushner has continued to

press forward with the 24-hour-

wall-cam idea anyway, viewing

the feeds as a crucial part of the

administration’s effort to demon-

strate irrefutable evidence of

progress. Trump asked Kushner

to take over the management and

messaging of the border barrier

project after the government

shutdown last winter because the

president was so frustrated that

work hasn’t been going faster.

Trump and other White House

officials also have been eager for

photos and videos of new barri-

ers, including aerial footage, that

the president can share on his

Twitter account.

“It’s understood that Kushner

is so aggressive because the presi-

dent has been asking him about it

all the time,” a senior White

House official said.

The July meeting that Kushner

led included White House acting

chief of staff Mick Mulvaney;

Trump’s senior immigration ad-

viser, Stephen Miller; acting

Homeland Security secretary

Kevin McAleenan; and acting

CBP commissioner Mark Mor-

gan.

Kushner has convened border

barrier meetings every two weeks

or so since then to press for a

faster pace of construction, tell-

ing others the president has told

him to get the job done and to

dispense with excuse-making by

aides, a White House official said.

It is unclear how much the

webcam initiative will cost, nor

how the technology will be used.

CBP has funds available for plan-

ning and mapping of the struc-

ture that could pay for the video

feeds, according to one person

involved in the discussions.

The hunger for a real-time

stream of wall construction un-

derscores the Trump administra-

tion’s eagerness to show the pres-

ident’s supporters and critics that

the structure is being built, even

as crews appear to be lagging

behind the president’s construc-

tion timeline and smugglers al-

ready have been finding ways to

get over and through the new

barriers.

After a recent Washington Post

report described smugglers’ suc-

cessful efforts to saw through

brand-new sections of the barrier

with ordinary power tools, CBP

officials acknowledged that breach-

es have occurred, and Trump has

backed off his claims about the

“impenetrability” of his wall.

Trump has repeatedly scaled

back his ambitions to build a wall

along the 2,000-mile length of

the U.S.-Mexico border, and in

recent months has pledged to

complete between 400 and 500

miles of new barriers by the end

of 2020.

His administration has finished

81 miles so far, according to the

latest updates, but nearly all of

that is “replacement” barrier that

swaps out smaller, older fencing

for a taller, more formidable barri-

er made of steel bollards that are

18 feet to 30 feet in height.

Another 155 miles of fencing

are under construction, accord-

ing to the latest CBP figures, and

273 miles are considered to be in

a “preconstruction” phase.

Kushner has insisted the 400-

to-500 mile goal is achievable,

believing that the pace of con-

struction will increase from the

current rate of two to three miles

per week to as much as six miles

per week later next year, the

senior White House official said.

As part of Kushner’s communi-

cation plan, the White House also

plans to work on more aggres-

sively promoting the project with

a dedicated border wall website

that will feature live feeds from

the border and real-time con-

struction data, the official said.

With Trump, Kushner and oth-

er senior White House officials

asking for progress updates and

images of construction crews in

action, CBP officials hired a pri-

vate contractor earlier this year

to build a website that would

allow users to track the project’s

advance.

The White House officials were

unimpressed with the CBP ver-

sion of the site, and they are

planning something more dy-

namic that will include the cam-

era feeds. In general, Kushner

believes the project has suffered

from lackluster effort and a lack

of urgency, the White House offi-

cial said, and he does not believe

contractors’ claims that their

construction methods are propri-

etary.

Ory Rinat, the Trump adminis-

tration’s chief digital officer, is

working on Kushner’s border

wall site, according to two people

familiar with the initiative.

While CBP officials insist they

remain on track to meet the

president’s 400-to-500 mile tar-

get, in private others believe that

goal is not realistic, especially

because the administration has

acquired so little of the private

land it needs in Texas.

Of the 166 miles of new barri-

ers the administration intends to

build in Texas, all but four miles

will be built on private land. The

rest will have to be purchased or

seized by the government. But

the government has yet to con-

tact dozens of landowners to

begin the preliminary work of

seeking access to their property

to start surveying.

CBP officials did not respond

to a request for comment Tues-

day. The Army Corps referred

inquiries to CBP.

David Lapan, who was a

spokesman for the Department of

Homeland Security in 2017 when

the agency was developing proto-

type designs for the barrier, said

the administration also has

struggled to claim it is building

“new” barriers in areas where it is

upgrading existing fencing.

“The challenge the administra-

tion has had is terming every-

thing ‘new construction,’ when in

most cases it’s replacement,” said

Lapan, who is now with the

Washington-based Bipartisan

Policy Center. “A camera showing

you building something doesn’t

differentiate between replace-

ment fencing and new fencing in

terms of something that didn’t

exist before.”

While CBP and the Army Corps

continue to describe the barrier

in more sober, technical terms as

a federal infrastructure project, it

remains a political symbol for the

president, Lapan noted.

“It’s become a pet project for

the president, and CBP and the

Army Corps wouldn’t be facing

such a communication challenge

if they could focus on the opera-

tional elements,” he said.

CBP initiated construction

work on an eight-mile span of

new fencing last week in the

lower Rio Grande Valley of South

Texas, the first place the Trump

administration is building where

no barrier previously existed.

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Webcams proposed at wall

Construction live stream

pitched despite pushback

from agencies involved

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