JANUARY 22, 2025 – The Coast Guard announced immediate action on executive orders issued by the White House Tuesday.
Benjamine C. Huffman, Acting DHS Secretary said “Under my statutory authority as the Acting Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security I have relieved Admiral Linda L. Fagan of her duties as Commandant of the United States Coast Guard.”
He continued “She served a long and illustrious career, and I thank her for her service to our nation. Admiral Kevin E. Lunday, by operation of law, is now the Acting Commandant of the United States Coast Guard and assumes all the authority and responsibilities of the office.”
“The U.S. Coast Guard is the world’s premiere maritime law enforcement agency, vital to protecting America’s maritime borders, territorial integrity and sovereignty,” said Adm. Kevin Lunday, the Coast Guard’s acting commandant. “Per the President’s Executive Orders, I have directed my operational commanders to immediately surge assets—cutters, aircraft, boats and deployable specialized forces—to increase Coast Guard presence and focus starting with the following key areas:
- The southeast U.S. border approaching Florida to deter and prevent a maritime mass migration from Haiti and/or Cuba;
- The maritime border around Alaska, Hawai’i, the U.S. territories of Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, American Samoa, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands;
- The maritime border between the Bahamas and south Florida;
- The southwest maritime border between the U.S. and Mexico in the Pacific;
- The maritime border between Texas and Mexico in the Gulf of America; and
- Support to Customs and Border Protection on maritime portions of the southwest U.S. border.
Together, in coordination with our Department of Homeland Security and Department of Defense teammates, we will detect, deter and interdict illegal migration, drug smuggling and other terrorist or hostile activity before it reaches our border.”