This just came across the Twitters minutes ago.
There isn't a statement from the White House yet, but I will update this post as soon as I have details.
Update: Ragsdale's replacement, Thomas Homan, was one of 9 DHS employees to receive the Presidential Rank Award in 2015.
Update 2:
Secretary Kelly's statement:
Today, the president appointed Mr. Thomas D. Homan acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Since 2013, Mr. Homan has served as the executive associate director of ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO). In this capacity, he led ICE’s efforts to identify, arrest, detain, and remove illegal aliens, including those who present a danger to national security or are a risk to public safety, as well as those who enter the United States illegally or otherwise undermine the integrity of our immigration laws and our border control efforts.
Mr. Homan is a 33-year veteran of law enforcement and has nearly 30 years of immigration enforcement experience. He has served as a police officer in New York; a U.S. Border Patrol agent; a special agent with the former U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service; as well as supervisory special agent and deputy assistant director for investigations at ICE. In 1999, Mr. Homan became the assistant district director for investigations (ADDI) in San Antonio, Texas, and three years later transferred to the ADDI position in Dallas, Texas.
Upon the creation of ICE, Mr. Homan was named as the assistant agent in charge in Dallas. In March 2009, Mr. Homan accepted the position of assistant director for enforcement within ERO at ICE headquarters and was subsequently promoted to deputy executive associate director of ERO.
Mr. Homan holds a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice and received the Presidential Rank Award in 2015 for his exemplary leadership and extensive accomplishments in the area of immigration enforcement.
I am confident that he will continue to serve as a strong, effective leader for the men and women of ICE. I look forward to working alongside him to ensure that we enforce our immigration laws in the interior of the United States consistent with the national interest.
And just as a reminder, the head of the Border Patrol resigned this weekend.
Morgan, an Obama appointee who had led the agency for only six months, had clashed with the National Border Patrol union The Washington Post reports, and was considered an outsider at the agency. Gil Kerlikowske, a former commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which oversees the Border Patrol, told the Post that the union never supported Morgan for the job and was likely behind his resignation.
Update 3: Well, this is interesting. Apparently we dodged the Kris Kobach bullet.
