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Bloomberg
The commissioner of Customs Border Protection resigned after saying he had been pressured to step down by Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas amid a record number of migrant crossings at the US-Mexico border.
“The President has accepted the resignation of Christopher Magnus, the Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection,†White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement. Biden appreciates Magnus’s almost 40 years of service and contributions to police reform as police chief in three US cities, she said.
Jean-Pierre earlier in the week declined to comment when Magnus told the Washington Post he had refused Mayorkas’s request to resign a day after the midterm elections, saying the president retained confidence in the CBP leader.
The White House didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on how the situation changed.
Magnus described a series of disputes with Mayorkas —who oversees CBP— in an interview with the Post, and said he had traveled to El Paso for a meeting with Border Patrol sector chiefs despite being told not to attend. He maintained that he didn’t intend to quit and remained committed to the agency, a calculus that apparently changed.
“I didn’t take this job as a resume builder,†Magnus told the newspaper on Friday.