Key Homeland Security official resigns
Asa Hutchinson is expected to leave his post on March 1.
Asa Hutchinson, the undersecretary for border and transportation security at the Homeland Security Department, has resigned, according to published reports.
The Associated Press reported that Hutchinson, one of DHS' top officials, submitted a resignation letter to the White House Monday morning. His resignation is expected to be effective March 1.
Hutchinson was the administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration for 16 months before being confirmed to the top border protection job at DHS in January 2003.
At his confirmation hearing, Hutchinson referred often to the parallels between the two jobs. He said the DEA job taught him about the importance of gathering "human intelligence," and in his homeland security job he planned to emphasize both collecting and sharing this kind of information.
At DHS, Hutchinson was responsible for overseeing the merger of the Customs Service, the Immigration and Naturalization Service and the Border Patrol into two new organizations: the Customs and Border Protection bureau, which handles border inspections, and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau, which focuses on law enforcement.
With his oversight of both the border organizations and the Transportation Security Administration, Hutchinson has been in charge of most of DHS' operational agencies and key security projects such as US VISIT, a program to track the more than 35 million visitors who enter the U.S. each year.
A lawyer by profession, Hutchinson was in his third term as a congressman from Arkansas when President Bush chose him for the DEA job. In 1982, when President Ronald Reagan appointed him U.S. attorney for Western Arkansas, he became, at age 31, the youngest U.S. attorney in the country.
President Bush announced on Jan. 11 that he would nominate Michael Chertoff, a federal judge and former head of the Justice Department's criminal division, to be the new Homeland Security Secretary. Chertoff is expected to seek to have input with the White House in filling top jobs at the department.