Today’s Challenge:  see if you can follow this single sentence:  After a brief White House meeting, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen has resigned, to be replaced as Acting Secretary by Keven McAleenan, currently the Commissioner of Customs and  Border Protection (part of DHS), which occurred just after the President withdrew the nomination of Ronald Vitiello as Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (also a DHS agency), all just after the announced resignation of Randolph Alles, the Director of the U.S. Secret Service (yet another DHS agency), while  Claire Grady, currently Acting Deputy Secretary DHS Secretary, will be reassigned or removed to avoid challenges to McAleenan’s installation (you can’t have two Acting’s) and possibly slide Ms. Grady further down the food chain lest DHS be deemed even more leaderless and mission-challenged than its public perception ... not for nothing does the annual Partnership for Public Service “best places to work” survey of 415 agencies currently rank both DHS and TSA near the bottom - #394 and #395 respectively.

This is one of many reasons I maintain my copy of the DHS organization chart in various-colored sticky-notes on the wall, the mobility of which allows tracking an approximate time-line of who precedes/succeeds whom to/from which of DHS’s approximately 22 sub-agencies -  including TSA, which has not been nearly as chaotic at the top (yet), but does fancy a constant re-naming and re-purposing of it’s functional offices and the job titles therein, making it nigh impossible to track who’s in charge of what this week.  One critic suggested the cost of new business cards throughout the agency has become a significant line item in the DHS/TSA budgets.

I won’t attempt to try to discuss the political nuances of these shifts – I’m not sure there is a rational path to pursue, given that it seems the entire government is in constant transition (again) -  Count the “Acting”:   There are interim secretaries at the departments of Defense, Interior and Homeland Security, an acting head of Office of Management and Budget, one more coming this Friday at the Small Business Administration, and an Acting White House chief of staff.

The President has noted publicly during this chaos that he “wants to go in a tougher direction”.  Ms. Neilsen noted in a tweet following her resignation, “I have agreed to stay on as Secretary through Wednesday, April 10th (n.b.: that’s 3 extra days) to assist with an orderly transition and ensure that key DHS missions are not impacted.”

Yeah.  That’ll help....